Composer/hobo/inventor Harry Partch (1901-1974) was a defiantly anti-establishment outsider whose chief contribution to the contemporary canon was his lifelong pursuit of challenging ways in which to smash the rigid formalities of the Western 12-tone musical scale. His own 43-tone scale shaped the framework for a multitude of pieces composed for beautifully odd instruments, which he designed and built in order to perform his works' intricate tonal wonders. John Schneider's Partch ensemble performs on re-creations of these wonderfully strange percussive and stringed contraptions, graced with names such as Cloud Chamber Bowls, Blow Boy, the Harmonic Canon, Boo, the Marimba Eroica and Spoils of War. Tonight's program includes Barstow: Eight Hitchhiker Inscriptions, San Francisco: A Setting of the Cries of Two Newsboys on a Street Corner and The Letter, with narration from Partch's hobo chum Pablo. Also Saturday, June 7.

June 6-7, 8:30 p.m., 2014
(Expired: 06/07/14)

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