Take a deep dive into the music that inspired, or was inspired by, the Jazz Age. Conductor William Eddins, one of NWS’s very first Piano Fellows, returns to NWS to lead Fellows in music by Scott Joplin, Maurice Ravel and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. These concerts will be hosted by Festival curator, Dr. Tammy Kernodle and feature soprano Louise Toppin.  

SATURDAY PRE-CONCERT CHAT AT 6:15 PM:  The Saturday, February 4 performance will be preceded by a discussion on African American perspectives on Europe during the Renaissance era hosted by Shawn Anthony Christian, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of English, Florida International University and Nathaniel Cadle, Associate Professor of English at Florida International University, joined by NWS Fellows. The chat will begin at 6:15 PM. There will not be a pre-concert chat on Sunday, February 5. 

This concert is part of the I Dream a World festival. Click here for a full listing of festival events.

I Dream a World: The Harlem Renaissance and Beyond is made possible with support from the NWS Collaborations Fund, the NWS Fund for New Ventures and the Keith and Renata Ward Family Fund. Knight Foundation and New World Symphony: Reimagining Classical Music in the Digital Age.

Festival Exhibition

LE PARIS NOIR: HENRY OSSAWA TANNER & LOÏS MAILOU JONES
February 3-12, 2023
New World Center, Clinton Family Fund Ensemble Room

Christopher Norwood, curator and founder of Hampton Art Lovers at the Historic Ward Rooming House, curates an installation from The Norwood Collection with art and related works of African American painters Henry Ossawa Tanner (1859-1937) & Loïs Mailou Jones (1905-1998). As the first internationally recognized male and female African American artists, they both found human and artistic freedom in France. Ticketholders can view the exhibition throughout the duration of the festival.

I Dream a World Festival Pass

A Festival Pass is your ticket to two weeks of live music, film, art and learning. For $150 or less, attend as many events as you’d like by showing your festival pass at the door. Click here to choose a Festival Pass.

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This concert is part of the Saturday Evening One and Sunday Symphony series. Secure a season of world-renowned artists—including Alisa Weilerstein, Heidi Melton, William Eddins and Christoph Koncz—performing an exciting range of orchestral music in one of the world’s most extraordinary and intimate venues for experiencing classical music: the New World Center. Subscriptions for the Saturday One Series (4 concerts) begin at $132 ($33/concert). Subscriptions to the 5-concert Sunday Symphony Series begin at $140 ($28/concert). Click to explore the full subscriptions! 

COMPOSE YOUR OWN SUBSCRIPTION PACKAGE! 

Want to try a little of everything? Customize your own subscription of three or more concerts to exercise full creative freedom while enjoying all the flexibility and perks of being a New World Symphony subscriber. Click here to build your CYO subscription or call the Box Office at 305.673.3331 to compose your series today.  

SUBSCRIBERS ENJOY THE BEST OF NWS! 

As an NWS Subscriber, you receive amazing benefits to enjoy throughout the season, including the best seats for the lowest prices and access to our incredibly talented Fellows. Click here to learn more! 

Program

SYMPHONIC PERSUASION

On the evening of Saturday, May 16, 1903, Will Marion Cook's In Dahomey, featuring George Walker and Bert William, opened at The Shaftesbury Theatre of London's West End. Earlier that day, The Daily News ran an interview with the composer. Among the topics discussed was London's thirst for "genuine negro compositions." To this, Cook spoke about the Afro-American desire to make themselves artistically seen and heard, and if that meant extending beyond the bounds of the United States, then so be it. "We are no longer content to live in New York," the composer revealed. "We are coming over to London, Paris, Berlin and Rome."

In Dahomey was a musical first—after its success at home, it went on a seven-month tour in England, including a Command Performance for King Edward VII on the occasion of the ninth birthday of Edward, Prince of Wales (the future Edward VIII). It would return to the United States, but the export of Black American art had begun.

You can hear folk and popular traditions in Cook's Dahomey, and the richness of that influence is deepened when other composers' musical inspirations are taken into account. It's as if every creator is contributing a tile to the grand quilt that is the story of Black Music in America.

Camille Nickerson, for example, returned time and again to the cultural fountain of her Louisiana Creole heritage and made it a cornerstone of her academic work. As a graduate student at Oberlin Conservatory, she published her master's thesis "Africo-Creole Songs of Louisiana." She collected dozens of songs through her research in Louisiana; it was a testament to her mission to preserve and transmit Creole sound. Equally important was not only her arrangements of those songs, but also passage to a wider audience. "Gue, Gue Solingaie" is one such song. It's a Creole lullaby, reminiscent of French art song, of soft a texture as the gossamer ambience of a humid summer evening. Here, the baby is lulled into a dreamland, full of talking tortoises, singing crocodiles and—surprise!—bobcats ready to pounce from the thickets. Like Nickerson, R. Nathaniel Dett is also representative of the composer who reached unabashedly into the seemingly endless bag of cultural folksong (in this case, Negro Spiritual) to apply knowledge learned in academies that taught Western Classical traditions.

Across the Atlantic, in London, Amanda Aldridge was born of a union that was itself multicultural. Her mother Amanda Brandt was Swedish; her father, the Black New York-born legendary Shakespearean actor Ira Aldridge. Amanda, the younger Aldridge daughter (not to be confused with her older sister, contralto Luranah) studied at the Royal College of Music with "Swedish Nightingale" Jenny Lind, but a bout of laryngitis ended her concert career. Instead, she turned to teaching and composition, writing under the pseudonym Montague Ring such pieces as Lazy Dance, a light orchestral work with a bit of a march flair in its step. After an intro that seems to tumble in from the rafters, that dotted eighth-sixteenth syncopation propels the music along, but it's in the trio that the swing takes on a characteristic of a drift, sans souci, along waters riverine.

Among Aldridge's close relationships in the United Kingdom was one with Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, whose Hiawatha's Wedding Feast received its premiere at the Royal Albert Hall in 1898. Coleridge-Taylor would soon write sequel cantatas to Wedding Feast, establishing The Song of Hiawatha as a trilogy. In addition, he would add an overture replete with sweeping drama and crashing symbols that melt into natural majesty of Longfellow's poem. Born in Britain, Coleridge-Taylor reached back to the United States for inspiration—Longfellow was the inspiration, and the Overture contains reference to "Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen." Hiawatha was so well received, in fact, that from 1927 to 1939 received an annual performance at Royal Albert.

Back in America, the famed ragtime composer Scott Joplin had ambitions of his own for the concert hall, or rather, the opera stage. Treemonisha was Joplin's dream project, a kind of morality tale that emphasized the triumph of reason and intellect over superstition. However, his popularity did not transfer to his operatic pursuits; Treemonisha was a departure from the ragtime for which he was known. Early attempts at a production were shambolic affairs; he died shortly after its failure. The world premiere did not arrive until 1971.

The exchange of musical cultural conventions runs deep at this time. In the 1920s French Composer Maurice Ravel indulged his admiration for Black American music—namely, the Blues. You can hear his approximation in the sliding pitches and nostalgic moans; the latter part of the movement is played with a pizzicato action that evokes the sound of the banjo, that most jet-setting of instruments. Compare this cross-reference to the sound of baritone and composer Harry T. Burleigh, whose tormented and anxious "The Grey Wolf" sets British writer Arthur Symons's poem of the same name. In turn, during Burleigh's time at the National Conservatory, the school’s director Antonin Dvořak learned from the student a great deal about the "negro melodies" that fascinated him so.

But through all the back and forth across borders terrestrial and maritime, real and imagined, the New York City's Harlem (itself named for a city in the old-world Netherlands) retained its status as a global cultural center. James P. Johnson celebrated those magnificent blocks his Harlem Symphony. The piece begins in Harlem, with a sparkling fanfare heralding the magnificence of old Penn Station. We board the subway and hurtle north towards Harlem, with changing melodic figures and rhythms signaling passage through Jewish and Latin neighborhoods, the bustle of shopping on 125th street, the wide street of seventh avenue, and final arrival in the historically Black section of town. An oboe introduces the slow second movement, "Song of Harlem," an ode to the place that is at turns sensual, nostalgic and romantic. Later we visit a nightclub in the throes of its irresistible swing, with an energy that becomes increasingly harried and frenetic. Finally, the hedonism of a Saturday night is washed away on Sunday morning; at the Baptist Mission presents a series of variations on a plaintive hymn, spiritual in nature. Fittingly, he concludes his celebration of Harlem with a nod to "Go Down Moses," the orchestra straining in the final bars, "let my people go."

—James Bennett II

James Bennett is a full-time reporter and some-time critic who lives and works full-time in Boston and some-time in Brooklyn. Music and food are most important to him. At any given point in time, you can find him frantically catching up on bookclub reading, sacrificing to the zeitgeist, cataloging records, or thinking about the next time he'll eat pâté.

Program

SYMPHONIC PERSUASION

En la noche del sábado 16 de mayo de 1903, In Dahomey de Will Marion Cook, con George Walker y Bert William, abrió al público en el Shaftesbury Theatre del West End de Londres. Más temprano ese mismo día, el periódico The Daily News publicó una entrevista con el compositor. Entre los temas discutidos estuvo la sed de Londres por “composiciones negras genuinas”. A esto, Cook respondió hablando sobre el deseo afroamericano de hacerse ver y escuchar artísticamente, y si eso significaba expandirse más allá de las fronteras de los Estados Unidos, pues que así sea. “Ya no estamos contentos viviendo en Nueva York”, reveló el compositor. “Nos vamos a Londres, París, Berlín y Roma.”

In Dahomey fue una novedad musical: después de su éxito en casa, hizo una gira de siete meses por Inglaterra, incluyendo una actuación para el Rey Eduardo VII por la ocasión del noveno cumpleaños de Eduardo, Príncipe de Gales (el futuro Eduardo VIII). Regresaría a los Estados Unidos, pero la exportación del arte afroamericano había comenzado.

En el Dahomey de Cook podemos escuchar tradiciones folclóricas y populares, y la riqueza de esa influencia se hace más profunda cuando se tienen en cuenta las inspiraciones musicales de otros compositores. Es como si cada creador contribuyera con una pieza al gran edredón que es la Historia de la Música Negra en Estados Unidos.

Camille Nickerson, por ejemplo, volvió una y otra vez a la fuente cultural de su herencia creole de Luisiana, y la convirtió en el pilar de su trabajo académico. Como estudiante de maestría en el Oberlin Conservatory, publicó su tesis “Canciones Africo-Creole de Luisiana”. Ella recopiló docenas de canciones durante su investigación en Luisiana, lo cual representó un testamento a su misión de preservar y transmitir el sonido creole. Igual de importante que sus arreglos de dichas canciones, fue también su paso a una audiencia más amplia. "Gue, Gue Solingaie" es una de esas canciones. Es una canción de cuna en creole, que nos recuerda a la canción clásica francesa,  de textura tan suave como las telarañas de una húmeda noche de verano. Aquí, el bebé es arrullado en una tierra de ensueño, llena de tortugas que hablan, cocodrilos que cantan y -¡sorpresa!- gatos monteses listos para saltar de los matorrales. Como Nickerson, R. Nathaniel Dett también es un compositor representativo de aquellos que buscaron imperturbablemente en la bolsa aparentemente sin final de canciones populares (en este caso, Negro Spiritual) para aplicar el conocimiento aprendido en academias que enseñaban tradiciones clásicas occidentales.

Al otro lado del Atlántico, en Londres, Amanda Aldridge nació de una unión multicultural. Su madre Amanda Brandt era sueca; su padre, el legendario actor de Shakespeare Ira Aldridge, afroamericano y nacido en Nueva York. Amanda, la hija más joven de los Aldridge (no debe ser confundida con su hermana mayor, la contralto Luranah), estudió en el Royal College of Music con Jenny Lind, a quien llamaban el “Ruiseñor Sueco”, pero un episodio de laringitis terminó su carrera de concierto. En cambio, se dedicó a la docencia y la composición, escribiendo con el pseudónimo de Montague Ring tales piezas como “Danza Perezosa”, una obra orquestal ligera con un toque de marcha en su paso. Después de una introducción que parece caerse de los travesaños, esa síncopa de corchea con puntillo semicorchea impulsa la música hacia delante, pero es en el trío que el swing adquiere una característica a la deriva, sans souci, a lo largo de las aguas ribereñas.

Entre los amigos cercanos de Aldridge en el Reino Unido se encontraba Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, cuya obra Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast (El banquete de bodas de Hiawatha) fue estrenada en el Royal Albert Hall en 1898. Coleridge-Taylor pronto escribiría la continuación de las cantatas de Wedding Feast, estableciendo The Song of Hiawatha (La canción de Hiawatha) como una trilogía. Además, añadió una obertura repleta de drama y símbolos excepcionales que se desvanecen en la majestuosidad natural del poema de Longfellow. Nacido en Gran Bretaña, Coleridge-Taylor buscó inspiración en los Estados Unidos: Longfellow fue la inspiración y la obertura hace referencia a “Nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen”. Hiawatha fue tan bien recibida que, de 1927 a 1939, fue presentada una vez al año en el Royal Albert Hall.

Mientras tanto, en Estados Unidos, el famoso compositor de ragtime Scott Joplin tenía sus propias ambiciones para la sala de conciertos, o más bien, los escenarios de ópera. Treemonisha fue el proyecto soñado de Joplin, una especie de historia moral que enfatizaba el triunfo de la razón y el intelecto sobre la superstición. Sin embargo, la popularidad de Joplin no se transfirió a sus intentos operísticos; Treemonisha constituyó un alejamiento del ragtime, el género que lo dio a conocer. Los primeros intentos a una producción fueron caóticos; y murió poco después de su fracaso. El estreno mundial no sucedió hasta 1971.

El intercambio de convenciones culturales y musicales era profundo en ese momento. En la década de 1920, el compositor francés Maurice Ravel demostró su admiración por la música afroamericana, específicamente, el blues. Se puede escuchar su acercamiento en las notas arrastradas y los gemidos nostálgicos; la última parte del movimiento se toca con articulación de pizzicato que evoca el sonido del banjo, el más lujoso de los instrumentos. Compare esta referencia con el sonido del barítono y compositor Harry T. Burleigh, cuyo ansioso y atormentado “The Grey Wolf” (El lobo gris), le pone música al poema del mismo nombre de Arthur Symons. En cambio, durante el período de Burleigh en el Conservatorio Nacional, el director de la escuela Antonin Dvorak aprendió mucho del estudiante sobre las “melodías de los negros” que tanto lo fascinaban.

Pero a través del ir y venir de las fronteras terrestres y marítimas, reales e imaginarias, el Harlem de Nueva York (llamado así por una ciudad en los Países Bajos) mantuvo su estatus como centro cultural global. James P. Johnson celebró esas gloriosas calles con su Harlem Symphony. La pieza comienza en Harlem, con una brillante fanfarria proclamando la magnificencia de la antigua Penn Station. Nos montamos en el metro y nos dirigimos hacia el norte a Harlem, con figuras melódicas y rítmicas cambiantes que señalan el paso por barrios latinos y judíos, el bullicio de las compras en la calle 125, la ancha séptima avenida, y el arribo final a la sección históricamente afroamericana de la ciudad. Un oboe introduce el segundo movimiento lento, “Song of Harlem” (Canción de Harlem), una oda al lugar que por momentos es sensual, nostálgico y romántico. Más tarde visitamos un club nocturno en medio de su irresistible swing, con una energía que se vuelve cada vez más tormentosa y frenética. Finalmente, el hedonismo de una noche de sábado se desvanece en la mañana del domingo; en Misión Bautista presenta una serie de variaciones sobre un himno lastimoso, de naturaleza espiritual. Oportunamente, concluye su celebración de Harlem con una alusión a “Go Down Moses”, la orquesta presionando en los compases finales, “let my people go” (liberen a mi gente).

—James Bennett II

James Bennett II es un reportero a tiempo completo y crítico en ocasiones que vive y trabaja a tiempo completo en Boston y a veces en Brooklyn. La música y la comida son lo más importante para él. En cualquier momento, lo pueden encontrar frenéticamente poniéndose al día con la lectura de su club de libros, sacrificándose por el espíritu de la época, catalogando sus discos, o pensando sobre la próxima vez que comerá paté.