Harry Partch

Harry Partch (June 24, 1901 – September 3, 1974) was an American composer. He was one the first composers to work with microtonal scales, writing much of his music for instruments he built himself, tuned in 11-limit just intonation.

Sound samples

• (ogg format, 19 seconds, 84KB) (1943, revised 1955), excerpt.
• (ogg format, 20 seconds, 103KB) (1963-64, revised 1966), opening of the first verse, which features the zymo-xyl (a sort of xylophone with additional liquor bottles that are also struck) and the crychord (a plucked string instrument).