The American Just Intonation Tradition

Abstract

Abstract The practice of just intonation began in America in 1928 when a young Harry Partch - inspired by the writings of Hermann von Helmholtz and Henry Cowell - burned all of his previous compositions in a pot-bellied stove in New Orleans, and began work on a new system of music. Over the next four decades Partch built his own orchestra capable of playing 43 tones to the octave. Others would follow, if less radically, Partch’s example. Partch’s apprentice Ben Johnston wrote ten string quartets exploring a wide world of tuning. Lou Harrison adopted microtonality through writing for Indonesian gamelan; Terry Riley and La Monte Young tuned pianos to just intervals. A younger generation includes Larry Polansky, Michael Harrison, David Doty, and myself. Unlike the European spectralists, the Americans sought not to imitate some natural paradigm, but to expand the materials of music and to achieve a more beautiful sonic resonance.

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