★Innova Recordings
I saw my mother ascending Mount Fuji
Just over one hour and five minutes, Harley Gaber’s “I Saw My Mother Ascending Mount Fuji” (2009, for Tape and processed Violin and Alto Flute) offers proof of music’s power to transport (the listener) in ways generally associated with film and literature. “Fuji’s” Kaidan-like atmosphere—the Japanese world of ghosts and spirits—unfolds slowly in its process of uncovering and revealing a deeper and different spirit world in what might be termed a spiritual journey: The ascension and transformatio…
Sonogram
Gamelan Son of Lion is a New York City based composers' collective and repertory ensemble exploring and expanding the variety of musical styles that may be performed using Javanese and Balinese percussion orchestra. The ensemble has performed around the greater New York area and on tours abroad since 1976. This newest collection of compositions for gamelan features premiers from recent concert seasons as well as a scattering of old favorites from the past. Works by ten composer-performers of the…
Enclosure 8
In 1985, Philip Blackburn climbed the stairs to an attic in Iowa City and started trying to make sense of the boxes piled up there. They contained a composer's life's work: scrapbooks, tapes, photos, letters, scores, and film reels -- fragile treasures documenting the 20th century from a most unusual viewpoint, perhaps the world's most original musician: Harry Partch. The idea was to publish them and reveal Harry to the world on his own terms. Not as the crabby, homeless, self-taught microtonal …
Enclosure 7
Harry Partch (like his friend Anaïs Nin) considered his life's work to be a letter to the world. His last act was going to be to add the enclosures. He never got around to it. After 20 years of working on the Partch archives, Philip Blackburn has now completed the seven-part 'Enclosures' series as it were on his behalf. Enclosure 7, the culminating DVD of this multimedia series, is a monumental tribute to the most significant works of this American original and iconoclast. It includes n…
Enclosure 2
This massive 4CD set is the second "enclosure" in the series. It is sub-titled "Historic Speech-Music Recordings from the Harry Partch archives," and includes "archival recordings, including works from the 30s & 40s, a lecture on just intonation, excerpts from the 1935 hobo journal Bitter Music, and a sound documentary featuring Partch at the piano