Roy Harris

"I recently talked wit ha friend who was a friend of the composer Roy
Harris..."

What's truly sad is that Harris was a native son of Oklahoma, and to the
best of my knowledge (I hope I'm wrong) his works are never peformed
here. At all, ever. It's like he never existed.

Usually our high-brow Okies grasp at any half-baked celebrity to claim
as a "native Oklahoman" -- a sort of
"good-image-for-the-rest-of-us-yahoos-by-association" ploy, even if the
person had to leave the state to aquire that celebrity.

But for some reason Harris appears never to have made the cut. I don't
know, maybe it's because he wrote high-falutin' classical music instead
of salt-of-the-earth country caterwauling.

That's Yokel-homa for you.

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "J.Smith" <jsmith9624@...> wrote:
>
>
> "I recently talked wit ha friend who was a friend of
> the composer Roy Harris..."
>
>
>
> What's truly sad is that Harris was a native son of Oklahoma,
> and to the best of my knowledge (I hope I'm wrong) his works
> are never peformed here. At all, ever. It's like he never
> existed.
>
> Usually our high-brow Okies grasp at any half-baked celebrity
> to claim as a "native Oklahoman" -- a sort of
> "good-image-for-the-rest-of-us-yahoos-by-association" ploy,
> even if the person had to leave the state to aquire that
> celebrity.
>
> But for some reason Harris appears never to have made the
> cut. I don't know, maybe it's because he wrote high-falutin'
> classical music instead of salt-of-the-earth country
> caterwauling.
>
> That's Yokel-homa for you.

I have a book, _Victor Book of the Symphony_, from around
1945, in which Harris was praised to the skies as the
greatest living American symphonic composer. I agreed:
the symphonies of his which i heard were terrific.
But his music has become scarce everywhere now.

-monz
http://tonalsoft.com
Tonescape microtonal music software

I've always been a big fan of his Third Symphony, but I'd like to know more about his other work.

- Dave

monz wrote:
> --- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "J.Smith" <jsmith9624@...> wrote:
>>
>> "I recently talked wit ha friend who was a friend of
>> the composer Roy Harris..."
>>
>>
>>
>> What's truly sad is that Harris was a native son of Oklahoma,
>> and to the best of my knowledge (I hope I'm wrong) his works
>> are never peformed here. At all, ever. It's like he never
>> existed.
>>
>> Usually our high-brow Okies grasp at any half-baked celebrity
>> to claim as a "native Oklahoman" -- a sort of >> "good-image-for-the-rest-of-us-yahoos-by-association" ploy,
>> even if the person had to leave the state to aquire that
>> celebrity.
>>
>> But for some reason Harris appears never to have made the
>> cut. I don't know, maybe it's because he wrote high-falutin'
>> classical music instead of salt-of-the-earth country
>> caterwauling.
>>
>> That's Yokel-homa for you.
> > > I have a book, _Victor Book of the Symphony_, from around
> 1945, in which Harris was praised to the skies as the
> greatest living American symphonic composer. I agreed:
> the symphonies of his which i heard were terrific.
> But his music has become scarce everywhere now.
> > > -monz
> http://tonalsoft.com
> Tonescape microtonal music software

>I've always been a big fan of his Third Symphony, but I'd like to know
>more about his other work.

What's great about it is his distinctive voice. What's not-so-great is his tendency to noodle aimlessly in development sections, and his wrapping-himself-in-the flag (not bad in itself maybe, but it made him political enemies on the Left post WWII...then he went to Russia and made Useful Idiot comments that didn't endear him to the Right either). Still, an unjustly neglected composer. The work of his that I'm most curious about his Symphony 11, which is supposedly the least optimistic of the Harris symphonies. It was written during the troubles of the late '60s.

More stuff coming out now though...symphonies on Naxos (3,4,7,9 IIRC), 2,8,9 on Albany, a nice new recording of chamber music by 3rd Angle. I'm quite fond of Symphony 6 myself.

--
Jeffrey Quick
www.en.com/users/jaquick
http://blog.case.edu/jeffrey.quick/
If your Renaissance band has a dumbek, the terrorists have won.