Bitter Music: Collected Journals, Essays, Introductions, and Librettos

by Harry Partch

Harry Partch was a maverick, an innovative composer whose adoption of the principles of just intonation forced him to invent new musical instruments capable of producing the pitches required by his forty-three-tone-to-the-octave scale. Bitter Music presents Partch's ideas about the place of music in society, his work as a composer, his compositions, and his unique instruments.

The anthology opens with "Bitter Music," a journal Partch kept while he wandered the American West as a transient during the Depression. Partch himself had thought the journal was lost. Deeply personal, it provides important biographical information on a formative period in his life and hints at the insecurity that pervaded his career, the institutional support he enjoyed one year and the economic hardship he endured the next. An important work of American Depression literature, the journal is unique for its inclusion of musically notated speech and folk and popular music. A second journal, "End Littoral" records a hiking trip along the rugged California coastline.

The anthology also offers twelve essays detailing Partch's provocative analysis of the relation of music and the composer to society. Two are published here for the first time; the others appeared in often obscure or ephemeral publications between 1941 and 1972. Included as well are twelve extended discussions by Partch of his own compositions, in the form of introductions or program notes, of which ten are published here for the first time. The anthology concludes with librettos or scenarios for six of his major narrative or dramatic compositions.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, Biography

520 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1991

Reviews

[Alex V. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am reading his journal from the 30's contained in this volume for research purposes, but goddamn it is good. Partch was a cantankerous, singular composer in the mid part of the twentieth century whose quest for his precise and peculiar music puts him in close quarters with French sailors, all the organ builders in London, hobos, William Butler Yeats, prisoners named Mandolin-face and Kain-tuck, and briefly, King George and Queen Mary of England, in locations ranging from the train yard in San Luis Obispo to the beaches in Italy. If you are unfamiliar with or not a fan of Mr. Partch's music, this tale might seem Quixotic at best, but for those already in his hobo camp, this is inspiring and revelatory.

[Dionysius the Areopagite · Rating 5 out of 5]

i want to re-read this. this was the first book i took out of the san francisco public library when i arrived there a wee lad a couple of years ago. i've been listening to harry partch all day now that my pal is making instruments. i guess this is one of those books you really wish everybody read at least once, or at least experience partch, but this one is hard to find. traveling america and crashing in homeless shelters. i should have just stolen this book.

[Bryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bitter Music music itself gets five stars. If you read between the lines you get one of the most revealing artist bios ever.The other essays fluctuate between two and three stars.