Harry Partch and the Better(stranger) Tomorrows
In stark contrast to the exploration of latent musical patterns that appear to be present in all cultures that Bobby McFerrin explored(as mentioned in yesterday’s post), Harry Partch was one of the systematic innovators of music in the twentieth century. He sought to imitate natural sounds of machinery and speech more closely than the traditional twelve-tone western model could achieve by putting 43 tones between the octave pitches.
Many composers in the twentieth approached music with a eye on progress. The assumption was that once people became acclimated to new styles and new tonalities, the music would be considered just as beautiful as the music of Beethoven or Wagner, but that never happened. Composers who took radical departure like Schoenberg, Cage, and Partch never achieved the grand celebrations and general name recognition that came to the great innovators of previous centuries like Beethoven and Biber.
Thirty-five years after the death of Partch when we look back at those twentieth century visionaries who sought to revolutionize art and sound are remembered, it is not for great works or contributions to form and theory that they are remembered, but instead for their gimmicks and diversions. And thirty-five years from now, the composers of our time and who are most celebrated will not likely be the most daring or new, but instead those who remembered how to serve the listener rather than drag them along on flights of fancy. Or perhaps we have lost something from that time when 4 minutes of silence could garner excited reviews. A sense of optimism and exploration at the prospect that no people previously have attempted to do what we are seeking to do now or that the future could be ours to reinvent.
If, in this spirit of optimism, the works of those twentieth century composers do not represent the next great achievement in art. Perhaps a broader philosophical hope that we do not need to be bound to the patterns and mistakes of our past but can instead create new ideas and motivations in progress towards utopian society. Efforts have historically failed, but it is this hope that makes the life Harry Partch so fascinating. Besides the music’s not so bad once you get used to it; is it?
Enjoy this documentary(6 parts):
