Harry Partch Music Scores

Mandeville Special Collections Library

The UCSD Libraries

9500 Gilman Drive

University of California, San Diego

La Jolla, California 92093-0175

Phone: (858) 534-2533

Fax: (858) 534-5950

URL: http://orpheus.ucsd.edu/speccoll/

Descriptive Summary

Creator: Partch, Harry, 1901-1972

Title: Harry Partch Music Scores,

Date (inclusive): 1922 - 1972

Extent: 5.00 linear feet (5 flat boxes)

Abstract: The collection of Harry Partch Music Scores consists of bound facsimiles of musical and theatrical compositions by experimental composer and instrument-builder Harry Partch, written between 1922 and 1972. Compositions include seminal works such as DELUSION OF THE FURY, OEDIPUS THE KING, U.S. HIGHBALL, and WAYWARD. The works are arranged by alphabetically by title of composition.

Repository: University of California, San Diego. Geisel Library. Mandeville Special Collections Library.

La Jolla, California 92093-0175

Collection number: MSS 0629

Language of Material: Collection materials in English

Access

Collection is open for research.

Acquisition Information

Not Available

Preferred Citation

Harry Partch Music Scores, MSS 0629. Mandeville Special Collections Library, UCSD.

Publication Rights

Publication rights are held by the creator of the collection.

Biography

Harry Partch was born in Oakland, CA on June 24, 1901; both his parents had been Presbyterian missionaries in China who endured the Boxer Rebellion. By the age of 20, he had moved through parts of the Midwest and East Coast, then back through Northern and Southern California before settling in San Diego in 1964. He began his early musical training playing clarinet, harmonium, viola, piano, and guitar and composing music using a tempered chromatic scale normal in Western music. He became frustrated with the musical tuning of Western music and subsequently destroyed all of his early works.

Interested in dramatic speech, Partch began to build his own instruments to reflect the musicality of speech and substantiate the intoning voice. His first instrument built in 1930 was the "Monophone", later known as the "adapted viola". Soon after, he was awarded a grant which allowed him to study the history of tuning systems in London and to try to gain permission to write an opera based on W.B. Yeats's translation of Sophocles' OEDIPUS THE KING. However, his grant money was depleted by the 1930s and he returned to the United States and to travel around on trains, as a hobo. He recorded his experiences in a journal named BITTER MUSIC (late 1930s) and subsequently composed BARSTOW (1941), a piece originally recorded for voice and guitar; the latter was transcribed several times throughout his life as his instrument collection grew. Additionally, he composed U.S. HIGHBALL (1943), a musical memoir reflecting his train riding memories.

After receiving a Guggenheim Foundation grant in 1943, he returned to completing OEDIPUS, recording from his own translation. In 1949, he published GENESIS OF A MUSIC, an account of his own music with discussions of music theory and instrument design, explaining his concept of the fusion of all art forms with the body as its central focus. He later wrote the 'dance satire' THE BEWITCHED, REVELATION IN THE COURTHOUSE PARK and DELUSION OF THE FURY, the latter recorded by Columbia Records in 1969. In the fall of the same year, Partch taught a course at UCSD.

Harry Partch is known for his experimental and conceptual compositions involving the 43-tone scale and his customization and design of musical instruments using raw materials such as retuned reed organs, glass bowls, bamboo stalks, liquor bottles, and car light bulbs.

He died on September 3, 1974 in San Diego. The majority of his instruments and papers are housed at the Alexander Kasser Theatre and Sprague Library of Montclair State University in New Jersey.

Scope and Content of Collection

The bound sheet music scores are arranged alphabetically.

Indexing Terms

The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.

Subjects

Partch, Harry, 1901-1974 -- Archives

Partch, Harry, 1901-1974 -- Scores

Microtonal music -- Scores

Monologues with music -- Scores

Collection Contents

COMPOSITION BY TITLE

box 1, folder 1, oversize FB45901

AND ON THE SEVENTH DAY PETALS FELL IN PETALUMA 1964 - 1966

Note

Twenty-three one minute duets and trios which later become ten quartets and quintets and one septet. Two copies.

box 1, folder 2, oversize FB45902

AND ON THE SEVENTH DAY PETALS FELL IN PETALUMA 1966

Note

Explanation of substitute verse 31 (p.55).

box 1, folder 3, oversize FB45903

BARSTOW- Eight Hitchhiker Inscriptions from a Highway Railing at Barstow, California 1956

Note

As part of THE WAYWARD.

box 1, folder 4, oversize FB45904

BARSTOW- Voice parts 1941

Note

Originally adapted guitar and voice; rewritten for two voices, surrogate kithara, chromelodeon, diamond marimba and boo in 1955.

box 1, folder 5, oversize FB45905

BEWITCHED- A Ballet Satire 1955

Note

In ten scenes. Version 1.

box 1, folder 6, oversize FB45906

BEWITCHED- A Dance Satire 1955

Note

In ten scenes. Version 2.

box 1, folder 7, oversize FB45907

BLESS THIS HOME- Poem by Vincenzo Prockelo 1961

Note

Written for Gary and Susie Everett.

box 1, folder 8, oversize FB45908

DAPHNE OF THE DUNES 1958

Note

A re-copying of the score composed for the WINDSONG in 1958.

box 1, folder 9, oversize FB45909

DARK BROTHER 1942 - 1943

Note

Text from Thomas Wolfe- GOD'S LONELY MAN.

box 2, folder 1, oversize FB46001

DELUSION OF THE FURY- A RITUAL OF DREAM AND DELUSION 1966

Note

Two acts.

box 2, folder 2, oversize FB46002

DREAMER THAT REMAINS- A Study in Loving 1972

Note

Original music commissioned by Betty Freeman to constitute a part of the film "Harry Partch- A Study in Loving".

box 2, folder 3, oversize FB46003

ELEVEN INTRUSIONS 1949 - 1950

Note

Numbers 1 and 2 are "Two Studies on Ancient Greek Scales".

box 2, folder 4, oversize FB46004

ELEVEN POEMS BY LI PO 1922

Note

Set to Music by Harry Partch. Text from THE WORKS OF LI PO, the Chinese poet.

box 2, folder 5, oversize FB46005

EVEN WILD HORSES- Dance Music for an Absent Drama 1952

Note

Text from Arthur Rimband's SEASONS IN HELL.

box 2, folder 6, oversize FB46006

LETTER- A DEPRESSION MESSAGE FROM A HOBO FRIEND, First written in 1943

Note

A special rewriting for the Freeman-Pouliot film.

box 2, folder 7, oversize FB46007

LORD IS MY SHEPHERD 1931

Note

Spoken expression by Cantor Reuben Rinder of San Francisco.

box 3, folder 1, oversize FB46101

OEDIPUS- Dance-Drama 1951 - 1954

Note

The text is an abbreviated version of Sophocles' OEDIPUS THE KING.

box 3, folder 2, oversize FB46102

OEDIPUS THE KING 1950 - 1967

Note

First version.

box 3, folder 3, oversize FB46103

PLECTRA AND PERCUSSION DANCES- AN EVENING OF DANCE THEATER 1949 - 1952

Note

1. CASTOR AND POLLUX- A Dance for the Twin Rhythms of Gemini. 2. RING AROUND THE MOON- A Dance Fantasm for Here and Now. 3. EVEN WILD HORSES- A Dance for an Absent Drama.

box 4, folder 1, oversize FB46201

REVELATION IN THE COURTHOUSE PARK- After the Bacchae of Euripides 1960

Note

A "double-tale" which alternates between THE BACCHAE and a modern parallel.

box 4, folder 2, oversize FB46202

RING AROUND THE MOON- A Dance Fantasm for Here and Now 1949 - 1950

box 4, folder 3, oversize FB46203

ROTATE THE BODY IN ALL ITS PLANES- Ballet for gymnasts 1961

Note

Music for an exhibition by Charles Pond's gymnasts at the University of Illinois.

box 4, folder 4, oversize FB46204

SIX POEMS BY LI PO 1922

Note

Set to music by Harry Partch. Texts from THE WORKS OF LI PO, the Chinese poet.

box 4, folder 5, oversize FB46205

Sophocles' KING OEDIPUS- Music, Dance, Drama- Based on the version by W.B. Yeats 1950 - 1967

Note

For a Intoners- Actors, other actors, singing voices, dancers, and two musicians.

box 4, folder 6, oversize FB46206

SUMMER 1955- A collection of small compositions written or rewritten in Summer 1955

box 4, folder 7, oversize FB46207

TWO SETTINGS FROM JOYCE'S FINNEGAN'S WAKE- "Isobel" and "Annah the Allmaziful" 1944

Note

For soprano, kithara, and two flutes.

box 4, folder 8, oversize FB46208

TWO STUDIES ON ANCIENT GREEK SCALES 1946

Note

For harmonic canon, bass marimba added.

box 4, folder 9, oversize FB46209

ULYSSES DEPARTS FROM THE EDGE OF THE WORLD- A Minor Adventure in Rhythm- First version 1955

box 5, folder 1, oversize FB46301

ULYSSES DEPARTS FROM THE EDGE OF THE WORLD- Second version 1955

box 5, folder 2, oversize FB46302

U.S. HIGHBALL- Voice parts 1943

Note

Originally for voice, adapted guitar, kithara, chromelodeon; rewritten in 1955.

box 5, folder 3, oversize FB46303

WATER! WATER!- An intermission with prologues and epilogues 1961

Note

Includes left and right chorus.

box 5, folder 4, oversize FB46304

WAYWARD 1941 - 1955

Note

A collection of musical compositions based on the spoken and written words of hobos and other characters - The result of my wanderings in the Western part of the United States from 1935 to 1941.

box 5, folder 5, oversize FB46305

WINDSONG 1955

Note

For film by Madeline Tourtelot. Rewritten as DAPHNE OF THE DUNES, 1967.

box 5, folder 6, oversize FB46306

YANKEE DOODLE FANTASY 1944

Note

On the Words of an Early American Tune.

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