Lou Harrison Biography Quotes 3 Report mistakes

Overview
Lou Harrison (1917, 2003) was an American composer whose work braided together Pacific Rim traditions, medieval and Renaissance practice, and a maverick American spirit. Equally at home writing for symphony orchestra and for instruments he helped invent, he became a leading voice in just intonation and a pioneer of cross-cultural composition. His circle included Henry Cowell and John Cage on the West Coast, Arnold Schoenberg in Los Angeles, and Virgil Thomson in New York; later, his life partner and collaborator William Colvig was central to the instruments and tunings that shaped Harrison's mature music.

Early Life and Education
Born in Portland, Oregon, and raised on the West Coast, Harrison gravitated early toward dance, poetry, and non-European musics. In California he studied with Henry Cowell, whose wide-open curiosity about world traditions and rhythm unlocked a path that would remain central to Harrison's work. He also studied with Arnold Schoenberg, gaining a rigorous grounding in counterpoint and craft even as he chose a tonal, modal, and modal-ornamental language quite different from Schoenberg's. The combination of Cowell's global outlook and Schoenberg's discipline gave Harrison a lasting technical and aesthetic base.

Percussion, Collaboration, and New York
By the late 1930s and early 1940s Harrison was composing for percussion ensembles and dance companies, often using found objects and new timbres. His friendship with John Cage produced Double Music, a jointly composed percussion piece emblematic of their experimental camaraderie. Moving to New York during the 1940s, he wrote criticism for the New York Herald Tribune under Virgil Thomson, absorbing a wide array of contemporary styles while sharpening his own. There he became a tireless champion of Charles Ives, conducting and editing music that helped bring Ives vital recognition; the public attention surrounding Ives's Symphony No. 3, honored soon after, owed much to advocates like Harrison.

Return West and Turn Toward Asia
Harrison ultimately returned to California, deepening his study of Javanese and Balinese gamelan, Chinese and Korean musical practice, and medieval European tuning systems. Guided by Cowell's example and by scholarship circulating among figures such as Colin McPhee, he pursued tunings outside equal temperament, especially just intonation and modes associated with slendro and pelog. This research was never academic alone: it fed directly into pieces intended for performance by living communities of musicians.

American Gamelan and William Colvig
In the late 1960s Harrison met William Colvig, an electrician and instrument builder who became his life partner and closest collaborator. Together they designed and constructed American gamelan ensembles from resonant metals and tuned bars, calibrated to Harrison's preferred tunings. The instruments became the sonic foundation for a body of works that reimagined Indonesian idioms in a distinctly American voice. Colvig's practical ingenuity and Harrison's ear for scale and timbre yielded instruments that could be built, maintained, and toured, allowing the music to flourish well beyond a single locale.

Compositional Voice and Major Works
Harrison's catalog reflects a humane classicism enriched by world traditions. La Koro Sutro, a radiant setting of the Heart Sutra in Esperanto for chorus and American gamelan, embodies his pacifist and internationalist ideals. The opera Young Caesar, conceived in the early 1970s with puppetry and Asian-inspired sonorities, combines historical subject matter with a frank affirmation of same-sex love. Orchestral works such as Pacifika Rondo, several symphonies including the Symphony on G, and the Suite for Symphonic Strings show how seamlessly he adapted modal melody and gamelan-influenced rhythm to Western ensembles. Chamber pieces like the Grand Duo for violin and piano and concertos for instruments including harp and piano extend his interests into virtuosic, architecturally clear forms.

Teaching, Community, and Advocacy
Harrison taught at various institutions, notably in Northern California, and was a steady, generous presence at regional festivals, including the contemporary music scene around Santa Cruz. He wrote essays and a widely circulated Music Primer that set out practical wisdom on tuning, craft, and artistic ethics, rendered in his elegant calligraphy. His social commitments, pacifism, environmental stewardship, linguistic openness through Esperanto, and gay rights, were not slogans but animating principles evident in his texts, dedications, and collaborations.

Allies, Champions, and Performance Tradition
Over the decades conductors and ensembles on both coasts kept his works in circulation. Figures such as Dennis Russell Davies and Michael Tilson Thomas programmed and recorded his music, placing him alongside other American individualists. Choreographer Mark Morris, recognizing Harrison's dance-born sense of pulse and phrase, made his scores central to several productions, bringing them to wider audiences. The web of support began with teachers and mentors, Cowell, Schoenberg, Thomson, and continued through colleagues like Cage and instrument builder Colvig, forming a community that mirrored Harrison's own ideal of a musically ecumenical society.

Later Years and Legacy
Harrison continued composing, refining tunings, and building instruments into his final years. He died in 2003, leaving behind an oeuvre that feels at once ancient and new: modal yet modern, crafted yet spontaneous, local in its handbuilt instruments yet global in sympathies. His practical approach to cross-cultural composition, study deeply, collaborate respectfully, build what you need, tune carefully, write beautifully, has influenced generations of composers, instrument makers, and performers. Today, American gamelan ensembles, revived interest in just intonation, and ongoing performances of works like La Koro Sutro, Young Caesar, Pacifika Rondo, and the Grand Duo testify to a living legacy sustained by the very communities and friendships that nourished his art.

Our collection contains 3 quotes who is written by Lou, under the main topics: Music - Knowledge - Stress.

Other people realated to Lou: John Cage (Composer), James Tenney (Composer)