Many of Partch’s most significant personal and creative moments came during his times spent in the California bay area. While born in Oakland, the family soon moved to Arizona. He lived in San Francisco for five years starting in 1925, soon after discovering just intonation and the beginning of his new direction in music. After a brief stay in New Orleans, he returns and begins performances of some of his first songs; before leaving again in 1932, he presents a recital for Henry Cowell’s New Music Society.

It rolls like this for the rest of his life. There is a particularly fertile period that starts when he moves out to the North Coast in 1947, living in an old smithy in Gualala. He was already starting into the building of his instrumental resources, including the new Bass Marimba, and would soon embark on his first major staged work, King Oedipus.

This short history I present is preamble to an intriguing article posted today by author Michael Flanagan, in the Bay Area Reporter, entitled Harry Partch at Opus: How the Iconoclastic Composer Performed at a 1950s San Francisco Gay Bar. Mr. Flanagan chronicles events of a period in the later 1950’s when Partch had become somewhat better known in the area. The article also sheds light on Partch’s engagement, if only on occasion, with the gay community of the time. He may not have often sought this audience regarding his artistic endeavors, but his uniqueness and charisma drew people to him and, in any event, he needed and wanted people to be aware of his work. One aspect of the draw, naturally, was the original nature of the sounds - and instruments - of his music. The photograph above shows Harry in a very common scenario: demonstrating his instruments for a fascinated gathering of people, taken in his studio within roughly the same time as the events in the article. I was glad to assist Michael and enjoy seeing another small episode in the continually intriguing life of Harry Partch, as well as a window into that era and locale.