The path of a musical maverick is a difficult and lonely one. Unlike composers who cozy up to local arts organizations, form the now-obligatory 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporations, and adroitly wrest money from foundations with topical projects, Phillip Arnautoff hews his own path.
As a young man in the 1960s, Arnautoff corresponded and met with Harry Partch (1901–1974). Along with John Cage (1912–1992), Partch remains the boldest and bravest American composer of the 20th century. After years of research—thoroughly documented in the seminal book Genesis of a Music—Partch decided that Western music took a wrong turn around the time of J. S. Bach (1685–1750) with the adoption of equal temperament. Unlike Cage, who undermined the very notion of music, Partch began anew. He devised his own tuning system, built an orchestra of instruments, and, by staging music dramas that made musicians into dancers and vice-versa, established the concept of “corporeal” performance.
Although deeply influenced by Partch’s approach to tuning and willingness to construct, modify, and re-tune instruments, Arnautoff is neither a Partch imitator nor a disciple. After playing his Five Epigrams and Interludes for Adapted Cello for me, Arnautoff noted his traditional fingering technique and remarked, “If I were doing it just the way Harry did, what would be the point of writing?”
For this rare public appearance, Arnautoff plans to preface the Five Epigrams with a brief talk about his work. Played on a half-size cello, these intimate Epigrams sing and sigh with mournful glissandi, like long-lost Appalachian string music leavened with the brooding intensity and structural sensibility of a Mahler symphony.
Phillip Arnautoff performs Sun Aug 28, Wall of Sound, 315 E Pine St, 441-9880, 6 pm, free.
