The ensemble
Partch
, based in Los Angeles, has specialized in performances of the music of
Harry Partch
using the instruments built by the composer, including some that involve a 43-tone scale. This release collects some
items that may be little-known but give an idea of the composer's fundamental sense of humor, and if you haven't heard much
, you might easily start here. Most of this music has never been performed. The title work
Sonata Dementia
, with its "Scherzo Schizophrenia" and "Allegro Paranoia," is for a chamber ensemble using the 43-tone scale. The
12 Intrusions
of 1950 are percussion-heavy works that lead up to
's grand experiments. There are also flirtations with jazz (
Ulysses at the Edge of the World
, written for but never recorded by
Chet Baker
), excerpts from an experimental film soundtrack (
Windsong
), a
Native American chant
recorded on an Edison wax cylinder in 1904, and most hilarious of all, a live recording of
himself, playing and explaining a 1941 work called
Barstow: Eight Hitchhikers' Inscriptions
, which is exactly what it sounds like: a setting, for voice and guitar, of hitchhiker graffiti
found in the California desert town of Barstow. There isn't a dull moment here. While
admirers may be the primary market, anybody will enjoy this. ~ James Manheim