Tag Archives: “classical” music

Music in Native American Boarding Schools

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Tentative course of study for United States Indian schools. Prepared under the direction of commissioner of Indian affairs.1

In the 19th and 20th centuries, the United States was attempting to assimilate Native American students in the white American culture. This was done in part by placing Native American children in boarding schools, and by 1925, “over 357 boarding schools were being
operated in thirty states.”2 The United States government the education of Native American children was the key solution to assimilation. Since that is what the government believed, they also believed that “Only by complete isolation of the Indian child from his savage antecedents can he be satisfactorily educated.”3 A major part of the curriculum when assimilating Native American’s into white culture was music.

The document above is a few pages from a course study made for Native American boarding schools specifically focusing on the music aspect of their education. This document really emphasizes the importance of music in a young person’s education as music “develops all the powers and functions of the human mind.”4 This document lists some requirements in educating the students with music. The first requirement listed is that the students are only allowed to listen to “only hear good music, aiming consistently in this way to develop musical appreciation.”5 It proceeds to list selections that someone deemed “good” for the Native American students such as the march from the opera “Aida” and William Tell” but “rag time” music is not good since it is mostly enjoyed by the “average person”.6 This document states that these students should learn about music by Haydn and Mozart for special occasions, and special attention should be pay to patriotic songs such as “the Star-Spangled Banner.”7 It is stated that the purpose of this course study is to lead the children to “an interest in singing” and to “preserve” their voice, “secure the ability to read music at sight” and to perform it correctly and pleasantly, and “to cultivate enjoyment and appreciation of good music.”8

In many cultures, music is rooted into their tradition, especially oral tradition. In Native American culture, music is not simply a form of entertainment, it is an essential part of everyday life and ceremony. Where Western tradition focuses primarily on music in terms of entertainment at a distance, Native Americans view music as an active and personal experience, not simply something that is for personal entertainment.9

Bibliography

Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915. Tentative course of study for United States Indian schools. Prepared under the direction of commissioner of Indian affairs, page 110-111. Available through: Adam Matthew, Marlborough, American Indian Histories and Cultures, http://www.aihc.amdigital.co.uk/Documents/Details/Ayer_386_U5_1915

The role of music in assimilation of students at … – gettysburg college. Accessed October 25, 2023. https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1217&context=ghj.

Footnotes

1 Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915. Tentative course of study for United States Indian schools. Prepared under the direction of commissioner of Indian affairs, page 110-111. Available through: Adam Matthew, Marlborough, American Indian Histories and Cultures, http://www.aihc.amdigital.co.uk/Documents/Details/Ayer_386_U5_1915

2 The role of music in assimilation of students at … – gettysburg college, accessed October 25, 2023, https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1217&context=ghj.

3 The role of music in assimilation of students at … – gettysburg college, accessed October 25, 2023, https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1217&context=ghj.

4 Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915.

5 Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915.

6 Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915.

7 Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915.

8 Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915.

9 Bureau of Indian Affairs. 1915.

Harry Lewis, Pioneering Black Classical Music

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Carl Van Vechten, Portrait of Marilyn Horne and Henry Lewis, 1961, in Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington

Henry Lewis, a prodigious Bass Player, was the first black performer in a Major orchestra in the US. He won a job in the LA Phil in 1948 at the age of 16, becoming not just the first black player to play in a major orchestra, but also the youngest player of any race to win such a job1. Lewis’s impacts on American Music were noted by contemporaries as he was appointed conductor of the New Jersey symphony. He also served as a conductor for service orchestras in the Army stationed in Europe2.

Lewis’s story in American Classical music forces us to consider the notion of whiteness in American Classical Music. Classical music in the U.S. has almost earned the label of “whiteness”. When we look at the musicians, the composers, the audiences, one would imagine that classical music has always been an institution by white people for white people. However this is not necessarily the case. Lewis’s position followed the rise of Black composers such as Burleigh, Price, and Dawson3. The National Conservatory in New York led by Dvorkak, seemed to be pushing a more diverse slate of classical music. However 30 years after Lewis’s death, only 2% of musicians in major orchestras are black and 4% of conductors of major orchestras are black4.

 

So where has the United States lost its momentum in diversifying classical music? One culprit may be music education. In his dissertation, Brian Gellertsein discusses the pervasive white supremacy that prevails throughout music education, despite years of understanding that classical music in the US has a diversity problem. He even suggests that our education of music educators is partly to blame, with standards for graduation and entrance that favor white, wealthy, better prepared students5. While Gellerstein finds no shortage of problems with music education, he is rather short on solutions. His argument also potentially implies that the key to more Black musicians may be removing the emphasis on classical music; a point that while maybe bears merit, poses new problems for the problem of diversifying classical music as an institution.

At an institution like St. Olaf, that works with a great deal of music educators, it is important that we not let the progress made by musicians like Henry Lewis go unfollowed. It is critical that we continue to look critically at the ways ensure diverse practices among our professors and future educators alike to build upon the legacy of Black classical music in the US.

 

1
“The Legacy of Henry Lewis: Watch & Listen.” LA Phil, www.laphil.com/about/watch-and-listen/the-legacy-of-henry-lewis. Accessed 27 Sept. 2023.

2
Henry lewis, pioneer black classical music conductor and dir. 1996. Jet. Feb 26, https://www.proquest.com/magazines/henry-lewis-pioneer-black-classical-music/docview/199975173/se-2 (accessed September 27, 2023).

3
Huizenga, Tom. “Why Is American Classical Music so White?” NPR, NPR, 20 Sept. 2019, www.npr.org/sections/deceptivecadence/2019/09/20/762514169/why-is-american-classical-music-so-white.

5
Robin, William. “Great Divide at the Concert Hall.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 8 Aug. 2014, www.nytimes.com/2014/08/10/arts/music/black-composers-discuss-the-role-of-race.html.

5
Gellerstein, Brian. “DARING TO SEE: WHITE SUPREMACY AND GATEKEEPING IN MUSIC EDUCATION.” University of Massachusetts Boston, 2021.

 

Copland’s Passion for American Music

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In reading through the letters from The Selected Correspondence of Aaron Copland, I was reminded of our discussions in class regarding the exerted effort to define and develop an American classical music. This proves to be a major theme in Copland’s letters, and it manifests in several ways.

One of the most explicit examples of his passion for cultivating American classical music is in a 1932 letter to the New York Times in response to his being misquoted as calling music critics a “menace” to American music. Regarding the conference during which he was misquoted, he writes:

Our purpose was the thoroughly serious one of considering the relation between the American composer and the music critic. . . . The composer needs the critic. . . . He is an absolute necessity, if only because he serves as the middle man between the public and the creative artist.

. . . The position of the American composer has changed, and . . . he is no longer satisfied with the merely tolerant and often apathetic attitude of the press toward American music in general . . . [as it is] no longer apposite to the body of vital music which is being created—and what is more, performed.1

In the postscript, Copland also writes:

In justice to myself I am forced to add that the above remarks are made distinctly in relation to new American music as a whole and not to my personal creations, which have almost always been quite sufficiently noticed, due to the particular auspices under which they were presented.1

Despite having great success as a composer himself, Copland is passionate about improving the attitude towards American music in general—a “thoroughly serious” matter regarding this “body of vital music,” in which critics are an “absolute necessity,” all very strong language, and aimed at the issue of American music more than the actual controversy of his being misquoted.

The conference at which he was misquoted provides more evidence for this passion. It was the First Festival of Contemporary American Music, in which Copland played a major administrative and musical role.2 In the letters sent around the same time as his note to the New York Times, he focuses on the success of the festival, and gives much encouragement to composers whose works were performed at the festival, an example of the encouragement he gives to other composers, students and colleagues alike, throughout his letters.

In his letter to Virgil Thomson about the festival, he writes, “I’m delighted for you because I feel it’s the first real success you’ve had in America. I’ll see to it that the League of Composers performs it in N.Y. next season.”3 This quote also brings up his involvement in the League of Composers, another organization championing American classical music.

In another letter about the success of the festival, he writes to Carlos Chávez of his fondness for the Mexican-inspired music at the festival, illustrating how Copland viewed Mexico as an appropriate and even desirable inspiration for American music.3 Incidentally, around this time Copland also traveled to Mexico, which his letters trace, and did seem to find the trip inspiring. In another letter to Carlos Chávez, he writes, “I regretted leaving Mexico with a sharp pang. It took me three years in France to get as close a feeling to the country as I was able to get in three months in Mexico.”4 The visit to Mexico inspired Copland’s piece El Salón México, which started him down the path of using Mexican and folk inspiration for his music, making it both American and accessible.5

American music was clearly a passion for Copland, and he was much more involved in developing and promoting it than he needed to be as an already successful American composer. From being active in organizations to supporting other composers to seeking out his own American inspiration, he saught to create an American music that would satisfy not only the composers but also as much of the American public as possible.

1 Crist, Elizabeth B., and Wayne Shirley, eds., The Selected Correspondence of Aaron Copland (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006), 91.

2 Ibid, 88.

3 Ibid, 92.

4 Ibid, 101.

5 Ibid, 89.

“Copland: El Salón México ∙ hr-Sinfonieorchester ∙ Carlos Miguel Prieto.” YouTube video, 13:36, posted by hr-Sinfonieorchester – Frankfurt Radio Symphony, Jan 22, 2013, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoILPBDsfvI.

When Classical Music Was Cool – Mid-1900s America

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Nowadays, and throughout much of history, highbrow classical music has typically been reserved for an estranged elite – an exclusive club that everyone could hypothetically join, but hardly anyone ever does. (Other than you of course, dearest Reader, who are most exceptional) The reason for this hierarchical cultural separation, both in music and other areas, is manifold, ranging from snarky snobbery to preposterous pretentiousness. However, this need not, and – perhaps more importantly – has not, always been the case. As noted in the March of Time database’s newsreel, Upbeat in Music1,

America’s serious composers are winning recognition from an ever-widening public, through performances by symphonic conductors like the New York Philharmonic’s Rodzinski…. The nation’s crowded concert halls testify to the new and growing enthusiasm of hundreds of thousands of everyday citizens for good music. The classics they have heard on records or on the radio, the moving artistry and musicianship of singers, who today are being heard by the whole country.  And, like Marian Anderson, are singing songs which are part of the native music of America.

The 3 Tenors – one of the strongest examples of classical musicians who became outrageously popular beyond the traditional classical sphere

As Karene Grad explains2, the divide between classical and popular music was much smaller in post-WWII America. She even goes so far as to say that “the years following World War II saw the popularization of high culture in America.” The arts at that time were a fundamental piece of the struggle to create an exceptional American identity. Unfortunately, arts are no longer such a valued piece of American culture and identity today. It seems as though new cuts are made in arts programs across the country every day, and that it is hopeless to try and fight against America’s modern STEM-centric worldview. However, we can take solace in the fact that there was a time when arts did play a central part in American culture, and perhaps, if we work at it hard enough, such a time might come again.

1 Upbeat in Music. Produced by Home Box Office. http://search.alexanderstreet.com/view/work/bibliographic_entity%7Cvideo_work%7C1792615. Accessed November 16, 2017.

2 Grad, Karene, Agnew, Jean-Christophe, and Cott, Nancy F. When High Culture Became Popular Culture: Classical Music in Postwar America, 1945–1965, 2006, ProQuest Dissertations and Theses. https://search.proquest.com/docview/304983472?accountid=351. Accessed November 16, 2017.

Florence B. Price

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On June 15th, 1933, Florence Price made history: the Chicago Symphony premiered her Symphony in E minor, making her the first African-American woman composer to have a work performed by a major orchestra.

This work, originally subtitled “Negro Symphony,” draws on many of the stylistic traits of African-American folk music without ever explicitly quoting folk melodies;  instead of writing symphonic music around a 12-bar blues or a spiritual tune, as did many of her contemporaries, Price instead incorporates some of the harmonic and melodic elements of blues and spirituals into her own unique voice.  The resulting composition is strikingly original.

Despite the high quality of her music, Price had difficulty attaining performances of her work.  In a 1943 letter to Sergei Koussevitzky, she explains the manifold struggles she faces as both a female composer and a composer of color:

“Unfortunately the work of a woman composer is preconceived by many to be light, frothy, lacking in depth, logic, and virility.  Add to that the incident of race – I have Colored blood in my veins – and you will understand some of the difficulties that confront one in such a position”

In the remainder of the letter, Price asks Koussevitzky to consider one of her compositions, insisting that he make “no concession” on the basis of race or sex, but rather evaluate the score on its musical merit alone.  Despite receiving many such letters from Price, Koussevitzky never programmed a single one of her works.

The underrepresentation and erasure of Florence Price continues to the present day: after searching several databases, I found that there is only one recording of the Symphony in E minor that is readily available to the public.  Scholarly research on Price’s life is also relatively sparse, with the writings of late musicologist Rae Linda Brown existing as some of the only works that honor Price’s life and pay homage to her music.  The conspicuous silence surrounding Price in scholarly and musical discourses clearly illustrates the racist and sexist systems that ceaselessly oppress female composers of color.  Performing, researching, and recording the music of these underrepresented composers is essential if we ever hope to dismantle these systems and construct a new musical landscape that truly offers equal opportunities for all people.

Sources

Fabre, Geneviève, and Michel Feith. Temples for tomorrow: looking back at the Harlem Renaissance. Indiana University Press, 2001.

Price, Florence B. “Recorded Music of the African Diaspora, Vol. 3.” Albany Records, 2011.

 

MacDowell’s “New England Idyls”

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In Edward MacDowell’s “New England Idyls,” he combines classical European harmonic elements with titles and epigraphs that evoke a purely American setting.  The resulting character pieces are incredibly descriptive and strive towards an American musical national style equivalent to the Russian style created by Mussorgsky and the Polish style created by Chopin.

the original art featured on the cover of “New England Idyls”

European harmonic idioms of the 19th century are very prominent in “New England Idyls.”  The third piece in the set, entitled “Mid-Winter,”is particularly rich in Romantic German- and French-sounding harmonies.  Throughout the movement there is intense chromatic saturation, typical of Wagner and Strauss.  Also reminiscent of these composers is the harmonic shifts by third instead of by fourth and fifth, which MacDowell employs to very dramatic effect.  MacDowell also writes colorful non-functional harmonies that are reminiscent of Debussy (of whom MacDowell was an almost perfect contemporary).

 

one example of MacDowell’s epigrap

Complementing his Romantic harmonies are MacDowell’s epigraphs. Similar to the titles of Debussy’s piano preludes, these short snippets of text frame the colorful, descriptive music, lending a sort of program to each piece.  Unlike Debussy’s brief and cryptic inscriptions, however, MacDowell’s texts are substantial and highly specific, evoking images of the New Hampshire countryside.  Most of the movements describe natural features such as An Old Garden, In Deep Woods, To An Old Pine.  Two others describe other facets of the American experience: Native American culture is represented (for better or for worse) in Indian Idyl, and a facet of white America’s religious history is portrayed in From Puritan Days.

http://webfiles.wulib.wustl.edu/units/music/supplcat/b10311282.pdf

As we have seen, MacDowell strives to create an American classical music by adopting a European musical style and imbuing it with American textual imagery from his own personal experiences in New Hampshire.  Whether or not he succeeds in this endeavor is up to the listener to decide.

 

Sources

Crawford, Richard. The American Musical Landscape. Berkeley, University of California Press, 1993.

Dolores Pesce and Margery Morgan Lowens. “MacDowell, Edward.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, accessed 24 Oct. 2017.

MacDowell, Edward. New England Idyls. Boston: Arthur P. Schmidt, 1902.

 

Beach’s Variations and the Success of the American Female Composer

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Amy Beach (September 5, 1867–December 27, 1944) was an American composer and pianist. She was primarily self-taught in composition and was the first successful female composer of large works as well as the first president of the Society of American WomenComposers. She worked to further the works of young composers and was also known as “Mrs. H. H. A. Beach” at many of her concert piano performances.

This is the cover of a manuscript being held in the Amy Cheney Beach Collection, which is housed in the Dr. Kenneth J. LaBudde Department of Special Collections of the University of Missouri - Kansas City.

This is the cover of a manuscript being held in the Amy Cheney Beach Collection, which is housed in the Dr. Kenneth J. LaBudde Department of Special Collections of the University of Missouri – Kansas City.

Amy Beach’s Variations on Balkan Themes, op. 60 was one of many great works she composed for piano. Based on songs “of unknown origin” collected by Reverend and Mrs. William W. Sleeper during their time living as missionaries in the Balkan region, the variations play upon “O Maiko Moya,” “Stara Planina,” and “Nasadil e Dado,” among other Balkan folk tunes. (Beach did not collect any of the folksongs her works were based on.) The variations employ switches between different themes to make up their complex texture.

The following is a loose translation of the text of “O Maiko Moya,” which is the first theme introduced in the work. Although there is no text to be sung or read with this work (this is a piano work, after all) this is important to the structure of the work and is suggestive of the overall tone of the variations and the cultural background that they were based on.

“O my poor country, to thy sons so dear,

Why art thou weeping, why this sadness drear?

Alas! thou raven, messenger of woe,

Over those fresh grave moanest thou so?”

The different folk songs do not all have to deal with Balkan nationalistic pride, rather, some texts relate to the mountains, or a story of a grandfather planting a small garden. As is the case in any piece written as a theme with variations, the variations gradually move away from the original motivic elements and provide new context for different themes.

In her analysis of Beach’s Variations on Balkan Themes, Dr. Adrienne Fried Block suggested that Beach borrowed from Beethoven’s tonal scheme for his Six Variations, op. 34. Beethoven’s Variations was one of the pieces that Beach regularly performed in her solo piano performances and one of the few variations that she regularly played throughout her career. It makes sense then, that this piece had such an effect on her own music. The Balkan Themes were in minor, which affected the tonal adjustments she made to the piece and prevented her from using Beethoven’s Variations structure exactly as it is (it should be noted that the speculation that Beach borrowed from Beethoven is a part of Dr. Block’s correspondence to a E. Douglas Bomberger).

Overall, Beach’s Variations are lively, yet melancholy in mood. Beach was known to incorporate romanticism and delayed resolution into her work, later on moving away from tonality. It is no surprise that Beach has been declared the first successful American female composer of large-scale music, although I think it would be interesting to explore the published music of other female composers and try to understand where they “fell short” of the success of their male counterparts, causing America to have to wait until the late 1800s for a female composer of Beach’s accomplishment.

 

Beach, Amy. Variations on Balkan Themes, op. 60. Boston: Arthur P. Schmidt, 1906. http://javanese.imslp.info/files/imglnks/usimg/0/0f/IMSLP08550-Beach_-_Op.60__Variations_on_Balkan_Themes.pdf.

Beach, Amy. Variations on Balkan Themes, op. 60. Performed by Virginia Eskin. Composed 1904.

Bomberger, E. Douglas, and Adrienne Fried Block. “On Beach’s Variations on Balkan Themes, op. 60.” American Music 11, no. 3 (1993): 368-71. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3052509.