Deep river harry t burleigh arrangement tv

It was my pleasure to be the pianist. The show argues that Burleigh was a major creative force — more than the pivotal transcriber of spirituals as concert songs. It takes an eloquently impatient Langston Hughes poem, and turns it into an expression of hope and faith. He believed that artists, not politicians, would most effect progressive change.

They find new worlds. But New York was at the same time a city of opportunity for Harry Burleigh. And the opportunities did not merely arise in spite of his skin color; sometimes, they materialized because — dignified and composed — he was self-evidently a young Black American unusual in talent, character, and promise. Jeannette Thurber, the visionary music educator who invited Dvorak to lead her National Conservatory, was part of a community of cultural leaders who — like Dvorak and W.

Du Bois — looked to Black America for direction. The conservatory soon acquired Black students — out of a student body totaling Meanwhile, Henry Krehbiel, the most influential New York music critic, turned himself into what would later be called an ethnomusicologist, studying vernacular music from all over the world — including the music of Native America, and of Africa.

The Lehigh Valley Chorale

But over the course of the s, Burleigh himself became an immensely popular black recitalist. In the long view, Burleigh commences a high lineage of Black vocalists whose renderings of the songs of Black America are buoyed by a courageous optimism. His first two great successors, both of whom he knew and admired, were Roland Hayes and Marian Anderson.

I was very moved by this performance. Your email address will not be published. Notify me of new posts by email.