Partch – Music and Performing Arts Library

Collection Information

Collection

Harry Partch

Location

Sousa Archives and Center for American Music

Provenance

The Music and Performing Arts Library Harry Partch Collection (previously known as the Harry Partch Archive) was created in 1978 by Professor Ben Johnston and Thomas McGeary for the purpose of collecting relevant material documenting the life and musical work of Harry Partch. The impetus for the Archive was a donation by Lauriston C. Marshall of a group of tapes, recordings, documents, and letters. Beginning in January 1991, Danlee Mitchell, president of the Harry Partch Foundation and Partch’s executor and heir, began depositing materials from Partch’s estate at the University of Illinois Music Library. Both archival record groups were transferred to the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music in Spring 2010, with published Harry Partch-related material remaining at the Music and Performing Arts Library Special Collections.

See below for a description of the contents of the different record groups.

When acquired

In 1975 the Music Library acquired a set of scores reproduced from Partch’s vellum masters through Irv Wilson. The Music and Performing Arts Library Harry Partch Collection was created in 1978 by Professor Ben Johnston and Thomas McGeary for the purpose of collecting relevant material documenting the life and musical work of Harry Partch. Over the following decade, many more accretions were added to the archive. Much of the work of collecting, organizing, and cataloging the material has been make possible through a generous grant to the Archive made by Betty Freeman in 1986, who also donated to the library some of her Harry Partch collection.

Description

The collection includes the following:

I. Harry Partch Publications, Special Collections Unit, Music and Performing Arts Library. Bound scores, microfilms of some conducting scores, books, dissertations (bound or on microfilm), back-up duplicate tapes, and records are housed in the general collection of the Music and Performing Arts Library. Items in Special Collections do not circulate. These items are accessed through the Music and Performing Arts Library online catalog. The Music Special Collections unit holds scores of virtually all of Partch’s compositions. In most cases, call numbers can be identified in The Music of Harry Partch: A Descriptive Catalog [ ML134 .P37 M33].

II. Music and Performing Arts Library Harry Partch Collection , Sousa Archives and Center for American Music. Archival material, interview cassettes, reel-to-reel tapes, photographs, musical scores and other discs and tapes (not to be played) are located in the Archive. These materials are accessed through their description in the online finding aid mentioned below. Individual collections of diverse material are kept as integral collections to preserve and document the unique, long-term relation between their donors and Partch. These may be original material or sets of photocopies of collections still privately owned or in public libraries. Each collection is inventoried separately. This collection also includes the records of the Bibliography Project, files containing originals or photocopies of articles (or sections in books) published about Partch. These are in three groups (a) copies of articles listed (and accordingly numbered) in the bibliography in the second edition of Genesis of Music, and (b) articles not listed in Genesis of Music (in folders grouped by decade). The first two groups go up through 1974, and are listed in the “Bibliography of Writings about Harry Partch” in The Music of Harry Partch: A Descriptive Catalog. A third group consists of various items about Partch published after 1974. To date, no attempt has been made to systematically collect copies of writings after 1974. Also includes the Ben Johnston Transcription Project records, a box containing correspondence and copies of transcriptions (in Johnston’s special notation) of a number of early Partch scores. The original cassettes of oral history interviews. THESE TAPES MAY NOT BE DUPLICATED OR DIRECTLY QUOTED FROM WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE PERSON INTERVIEWED. Duplicate cassettes, most of reel-to-reel tapes in the
Archive, or duplicates of tapes owned by other institutions or persons.

III. Harry Partch Estate Archive, Sousa Archives and Center for American Music . Beginning in January 1991, Danlee Mitchell, president of the Harry Partch Foundation and Partch’s executor and heir, began depositing materials from Partch’s estate at the University of Illinois Music and Performing Arts Library . Individual folders contain small groups of letters or documents either originals or photocopies.

Access/Finding Aids/Bibliography

For materials in Special Collections, refer to The Music of Harry Partch: A Descriptive Catalog .

See the Music and Performing Arts Library Harry Partch Collection, 1914-2007 Finding Aid at the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music.