Florence Price

It would seem that Florence Price was just waiting for me to discover her.

On the RSCM Facebook group I am a member of I saw a post on the fundamentally important theme of #BlackLivesMatter linking to a performance of Price's "Adoration", in memory of George Floyd. I had already searched for a black composer of anglican music to include here, in some small way offering my own contribution to such an important movement - to no avail. But here I was being offered a perfect example, which has also proved wonderfully coincidental as well.

Florence Price was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, USA on April 9th 1887, one of three children in a mixed race family. She had her first piano performance at the age of four and had her first composition published at the age of 11. by the time she was 14 she had graduated as top of her class, and went on to study music at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts, majoring in piano and organ. She achieved a level of renown which defied all expectations for an African-American woman in her day. Acutely aware of her heritage, initially Florence identified as Mexican to avoid prejudice for being African American.

Price returned to Arkansas on graduating, but following a series of racial incidents, including the lynching of a black man; her family moved as part of the Great Migration - leaving the Deep South to head north. Her family settled in Chicago, where Price began her career. She studied composition, orchestration and organ with leading teachers in the city, publishing four pieces for piano in 1928. 

A highly educated individual, Price studied languages and liberal arts subjects as well as music. She divorced in 1931 after financial struggles and an abusive relationship. A single mother to her two daughters she worked as an organist for silent film screenings and composed songs for radio ads under a pen name to earn a living.  She eventually moved in with her student and friend, Margaret Bonds, also a black pianist and composer. Together they began to achieve national recognition.

Being deeply religious, Price's music combined the music of the African-American church incorporating elements of African-American spirituals, emphasising the rhythm and syncopation of the spirituals rather than just using the text. Her melodies were blues-inspired and mixed with more traditional, European Romantic techniques. (Wikipedia)

John Michael Cooper has writes:-

Today she is celebrated as the first African American woman to have her music performed by a major U.S. orchestra (her First Symphony was performed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as part of the World’s Fair in 1933), and her fame has spread far beyond than that, and lasted much longer. She penned hundreds of compositions of astonishing richness and breadth which gave voice to a musical imagination that would not be stilled despite the limitations that her world would have imposed on her because of her race and her sex.

Price was a prolific composer. Wikipedia has a full list of her work here. In 2018 the New Yorker published an article on the rediscovery of her music and notes the reason for the shocking neglect of her music.

The reasons for the shocking neglect of Price’s legacy are not hard to find.

In a 1943 letter to the conductor Serge Koussevitzky, she introduced herself thus: “My dear Dr. Koussevitzky, To begin with I have two handicaps—those of sex and race. I am a woman; and I have some Negro blood in my veins.”

 This week as a choir we are remotely recording and multi-tracking Tippett's "Nobody Knows", which Price also arranged - hence why I felt it a coincidence that I came across her name today. Price's arrangement was for piano solo, but she composed many choral pieces too.

The performance I referred to above was "Adoration". I hope you don't mind that I've shared it below. Whilst not a piece of sacred music in the strict Anglican sense, it is a beautiful piece and in the context of this week I felt compelled to share.

I believe God sees our souls, not our skin colour; our intentions not our facade. It's a tragedy that individuals are discriminated against in a way that God would find unimaginable. I hope we hear more from black musicians in the future in a context which is more fair and just.

 

Below is a list of music collection of service music, anthems, and organ works by Black composers  compiled by Emily Bishai. Her original tweet is here.