[acid-jazz] Lou Harrison

From: Leslie Shill (icehouse_at_redshift.com)
Date: 2003-02-05 05:04:48

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    The great composer Lou Harrison died in Aptos yesterday. Lou was one of
    the shining stars of the American musical firmament. His works were
    inspiring and inspired, he used the creative forces inside himself to the
    best advantage possible and established himself over the years as someone
    who not only was creative but also as someone who stood by his firm
    beliefs in no uncertain terms. Lou was born in 1917 in Portland, Oregon
    and he studied with a diverse group of teachers ranging from Henry Cowell,
    Arnold Schoenberg, Virgil Thomas and Howard Cooper and this is only a
    partial list! He was as much a theorist as he was a creative force and he
    supported many artists as they battled to form their own perspectives of
    the musical universe. Lou received grants and awards from a long list of
    admiring artistic patrons and he was commissioned to create music for an
    esteemed congregation of musical stars, from Merce Cunningham to the Mark
    Morris Company, Lester Horton, Jean Erdman and for many of the great
    orchestral companies in the world. Aside from his musical output, Lou
    Harrison was also an accomplished poet and a calligrapher of note.
    Harriosn played a leading role in introducing the Indonesian Gamelan to
    the USA and, with his partner William Colvig he constructed two large
    gamelan now in use at San Jose State University and Mills College. The
    written work produced by Harrison has been translated into many languages
    and his book, "Music Primer" was re-published in Japanese and English in
    1994. Lou Harrison has been championed by many leading conductors, amongst
    them Michael Tilson Thomas and Dennis Russell Davis who presented
    Lou's "New First Suite For Strings" in its premiere just this past
    November. Lou produced a large body of work over the 50 years that he
    composed music. He studied jazz piano and he was known as an accompanist
    and dancer of note. Charles Ives came into contact with Lou and took a
    serious interest in his work and compositions and Ives supported Harrison
    supporting him through some hard times and his composition "Rapunzel" won
    him the Twentieth Century Masterpiece Award which was presented to him byu
    Stravinsky. When Ives won the Pulitzer Prize he shared the prize with Lou
    Harrison who had just finished preparing the score for Ives' Symphony No.3
    and conducting its premier. Lou believed that music is a pleasure and that
    one has sometimes to pay for that pleasure and during his life he worked
    as many different things, from florist, record store clerk, animal nurse
    and forester in order to keep himself going and to pay his bills! To give
    you anidea of the breadth of his comnpositions and musical scope, read the
    following which I gratuitously copied from the web so that I would not
    have to re-write it, this covers only his "other works" and does not even
    touch his more formal compositions!

    Pacifika Rondo fuses together ideas and instruments from many traditions
    in movements dedicated to Korea, Mexico and the Aztec empire, the Sinitic
    Area, the colonial days of California, the dolphins and ocean, and a
    protest against the bomb and the destruction of Pacific life.

    La Koro Sutra (The Heart Sutra) incorporates a chorus, organ, Gamelan,
    harp, percussion, and bells combining 4 five-tone modes, 2 six-tone modes,
    and 2 twelve-tone modes

    Third Symphony blends American folk dances, a Gamelan, and an estampie

    Ariadne uses an octatonic scale as a raga-like pitch collection; the solo
    flute line resembles an alap (improvised melody within mode)

    Philemon and Baukis blends a solo violin and Javanese Gamelan.

    Some of his compositions are based on twelve-tone rows, but in a chromatic
    fashion. Serial opera Rapunzel incorporates a row based on upper leading
    tones moving to the tonic.

    Many of his works remain unpublished. Haiku incorporates, a mixed chorus,
    harp, wind-chimes, gong, and shiao (vertically notched Chinese flute).
    This one-page work follows the structure and spirit of a haiku.
    -Peace Piece Two is a meditation contemplating President Lyndon Johnson's
    decisions about America's role in Vietnam. It features a tenor chanting
    over the continuous percussion ostinato. The various tempi are not meant
    to coincide; they "cosound." At the climax, the strings are given specific
    pitches on which they improvise rhythms. This creates a 'textured' or
    rhythmically active chord.

    Wrote Piano Concerto for Keith Jarrett. At first Harrison was reluctant
    because the conventional form would make him part of the establishment,
    but then he decided to compose in Kirnberger's #2 well-temperament

    Lou Harrison was one of those marvels of humanity who worked away at his
    art and chosen form of creativity, his intelligence and sense of humour
    runs through the creativity of all those who came to know him. It always
    surprise me just how many people who are serious music fans fail to even
    raise an eyebrow when they hear the name Lou Harrison, for most people he
    just does not register and yet much of the ideas he brought to his music
    are now part of the modern musical lexicon and people do not even think
    twice about them he was truly on of the great composers of the last
    hundred years and I take this moment to salute Lou Harrison!

    leslie Shill
    The LSDJ - The Power of
    Sound