75/1

Synopsis

Thomas has been a professional drummer all through his life until he got asked to revive Harry Partch’s lifework. In his tiny garage in Cologne, he starts reconstructing all of Partch’s 75 custom-made instruments. He has only two years to get everything ready for the grand premiere at the National Theater in Taiwan. 75/1 observes the abysses of a man, who between insomnia and isolation, has only one determination to finish the work he had started.

Statement

Especially in the arts, rules are there to be broken. Harry Partch is one of the most underrated musical geniuses who tried to break every convention. His fervent drive to defy the norms of composing, playing and building musical instruments must be the reason he is so beloved by musical scholars. Likewise, it has to also be the reason he remains unknown to most. It sounds familiar, yet outlandish and requires time to fully appreciate.
As Thomas set on to reverse engineer 75 of Partch’s instruments that have been lost to material decay, he became the world’s expert on these wonderfully peculiar instruments. Thomas suffered a great deal of personal pain to see them being shipped oversees and played by an entire orchestra. It’s incredibly tough to weigh the joy of such an achievement against the price of estranging one’s surroundings and neither is a solution to this inner conflict desirable. Hindsight is not always a reasonable concept to arrive at after a journey. This false dichotomy is what this film is about.

Credits

Starring

Thomas Meixner | Ensemble Musikfabrik