source file: mills2.txt Date: Thu, 15 Aug 1996 09:19:41 -0700 Subject: From McLaren From: John Chalmers From: mclaren Subject: Innova Partch 4-CD release -- One correspondent mentioned s/he hadn't heard of the Innova Records Partch release. This is arguably the most important collection of Partch compositions yet released on CD. The collection includes 4 74+-minute CDs, an elaborate and informative booklet complete the text of several Partch manuscripts not reprinted since the 1940s, and some fascinating archival photos. Included are: By the Rivers of Babylon Ten Li Po Lyrics Barstow (1942 version) San Francisco - Newsboy Cries While my Heart Keeps Beating Time (the only survivng Partch pop song from the 1930s!) Two Settings from Joyce's "Finnegan's Wake" Dark Brother A Quarter-Saw Section of Motivations and Intonations Warren Burt's almost-complete performance of "Bitter Music" Yankee Doodle Fantasy--On the Words of an Early American Tune O Frajous Day! Ring Around the Moon and Bless This House. Apparently the Minnesota Composers Forum collaborated with Dr. Philip Blackburn to explore the Partch archives and extract many early and all-but-unavailable recordings. Some of these recordings were released originally in 1950 on a 78 r.p.m. limited- release record. However, the most important part (to these old ears) of this collection is the Quarter-Saw Section, a full 60-minute stereo tape worked up and re-worked by Partch for a presentation to a meeting of the American Society of Composers in 1967. The tape wasn't ready on time and as a result no one has heard this seminal document for 30 years. Only a tiny fragment of the 60-minute total is published in "Bitter Music;" the vast bulk of the material, replete with Harry's explanations of his harmonic and melodic practices, the resources of Monophony, why his system was never limited to 43 just tones, and so on, is entirely new. This is the most astonishingly complete document of Partch's musical system and compositional practices extant. It far exceeds in detail and in breadth either the 1933 "Exposition of Monophony," the 1942 "Resume of the Musical Philosophy and Work of Harry Partch," the 1947 "Genesis of A Music," or the 1974 "Genesis of a Music." This collection is a breakthrough in Partch scholarship because it gives audible and visual access to current generations of Partch fans and scholars materials long since unavailable. The audio quality ranges from superb (the reel tape of "Quarter-Saw Section") to atrocious (DAT copies of original 78 r.p.m. records, which were clearly either recorded at the wrong speed or are played back at the wrong speed--they are obviously a semitone too high in pitch, or, if you prefer, about 5% too fast). Does this matter? Not if you're a Partch fan. The collection is a must-have. Oddly enough, this 4-CD set showed up in the record bin at a large Tower Records "A" store. The list price is about a hundred bucks, but Tower had it for $67.00-- a real bargain. The chances are good that any sufficiently large record store with carry or can order this Innova 4-CD collection for you. It's a "must have." --mclaren Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Thu, 15 Aug 1996 20:58 +0200 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA14614; Thu, 15 Aug 1996 20:58:38 +0200 Received: from eartha.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA14717 Received: from by eartha.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) for id LAA07390; Thu, 15 Aug 1996 11:58:36 -0700 Date: Thu, 15 Aug 1996 11:58:36 -0700 Message-Id: <40960815185704/0005695065PK3EM@MCIMAIL.COM> Errors-To: madole@ella.mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu