Black Composers
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Black Composers
This is a list of composers of African ancestry. A * Michael Abels, USA (born 1962) * Mohamed Abdelwahab Abdelfattah, Egypt (born 1962) * Muhal Richard Abrams, USA (1930–2017) * H. Leslie Adams, USA (born 1932) * Eleanor Alberga, Jamaica (born 1949) * Alcione, Brazil (born 1947) * Amanda Christina Elizabeth Aldridge (Montague Ring), England (1866–1956) * Kenneth Amis, USA (born 1970) * Thomas Jefferson Anderson (TJ), USA (born 1928) * Lil Hardin Armstrong, USA (1898–1971) B * David Baker, USA (1931–2016) * Count Basie, USA, pianist, bandleader * Leon Bates, USA, pianist * Catalina Berroa, Cuba (1849–1911) * Eubie Blake (James Hubert Blake), USA (1883–1983) * James A. Bland, USA (1854–1911) * Margaret Allison Bonds, USA (1913–1972) * John William Boone, USA (1864–1927) * Anthony Braxton, USA (born 1945) * George Bridgetower, Poland (1779–1860), violinist and composer * Courtney Bryan, USA (born 1982/1983), pianist and composer * James Tim Brymn, USA (1 ...
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H Leslie Adams
H, or h, is the eighth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''aitch'' (pronounced , plural ''aitches''), or regionally ''haitch'' ."H" ''Oxford English Dictionary,'' 2nd edition (1989); ''Merriam-Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged'' (1993); "aitch" or "haitch", op. cit. History The original Semitic letter Heth most likely represented the voiceless pharyngeal fricative (). The form of the letter probably stood for a fence or posts. The Greek Eta 'Η' in archaic Greek alphabets, before coming to represent a long vowel, , still represented a similar sound, the voiceless glottal fricative . In this context, the letter eta is also known as Heta to underline this fact. Thus, in the Old Italic alphabets, the letter Heta of the Euboean alphabet was adopted with its original sound value . While Etruscan and La ...
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Margaret Allison Bonds
Margaret Allison Bonds ( – ) was an American composer, pianist, arranger, and teacher. One of the first Black composers and performers to gain recognition in the United States, she is best remembered today for her popular arrangements of African-American spirituals and frequent collaborations with Langston Hughes. Life Family background and life Margaret Jeanette Allison Majors was born on March 3, 1913, in Chicago, Illinois. Her father, Monroe Alpheus Majors, was an active force in the civil rights movement as a physician and writer. His work included the founding of a medical association for black physicians who were denied membership in the American Medical Association on the basis of race. As an author, Majors is known for his book, '' Noted Negro Women: Their Triumphs and Activities'' (1893), and for his work as editor of several African-American newspapers. Her mother, Estelle C. Bonds, was a church musician and member of the National Association of Negro Musicians. ...
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Alice Coltrane
Alice Coltrane (' McLeod; August 27, 1937January 12, 2007), also known by her adopted Sanskrit name Turiyasangitananda, was an American jazz musician and composer, and in her later years a swamini. An accomplished pianist and one of the few harpists in the history of jazz, she recorded many albums as a bandleader, beginning in the late 1960s and early 1970s for Impulse! and other record labels. She was married to jazz saxophonist and composer John Coltrane, with whom she performed in 1966–1967. One of the foremost exponents of spiritual jazz, her eclectic music proved widely influential both within and outside the world of jazz. Coltrane's professional music career slowed from the mid 1970s as she became more dedicated to her religious education. She founded the Vedantic Center in 1975 and the Shanti Anantam Ashram in California in 1983, where she served as spiritual director. On July 3, 1994, Swamini rededicated and inaugurated the land as Sai Anantam Ashram'' During the 19 ...
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Ornette Coleman
Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman (March 9, 1930 – June 11, 2015) was an American jazz saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter, and composer known as a principal founder of the free jazz genre, a term derived from his 1960 album '' Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation''. His pioneering performances often abandoned the chordal and harmony-based structure found in bebop, instead emphasizing a jarring and avant-garde approach to improvisation. AllMusic called him "one of the most important (and controversial) innovators of the jazz avant-garde". Born in Fort Worth, Texas, Coleman began his musical career playing in local R&B and bebop groups, and eventually formed his own group in Los Angeles featuring members such as Ed Blackwell, Don Cherry, Charlie Haden, and Billy Higgins. In 1959, he released the controversial album ''The Shape of Jazz to Come'' and began a long residency at the Five Spot jazz club in New York City. His 1960 album ''Free Jazz'' would profoundly influence the di ...
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England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe by the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south. The country covers five-eighths of the island of Great Britain, which lies in the North Atlantic, and includes over 100 smaller islands, such as the Isles of Scilly and the Isle of Wight. The area now called England was first inhabited by modern humans during the Upper Paleolithic period, but takes its name from the Angles, a Germanic tribe deriving its name from the Anglia peninsula, who settled during the 5th and 6th centuries. England became a unified state in the 10th century and has had a significant cultural and legal impact on the wider world since the Age of Discovery, which began during the 15th century. The English language, the Anglican Church, and Engli ...
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Samuel Coleridge-Taylor
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (15 August 18751 September 1912) was a British composer and conductor. Of mixed-race birth, Coleridge-Taylor achieved such success that he was referred to by white New York musicians as the "African Mahler" when he had three tours of the United States in the early 1900s. He was particularly known for his three cantatas on the epic 1855 poem ''The Song of Hiawatha'' by American Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Coleridge-Taylor premiered the first section in 1898, when he was 22. He married a British woman, Jessie Walmisley, and both their children had musical careers. Their son Hiawatha adapted his father's music for a variety of performances. Their daughter Avril Coleridge-Taylor became a composer-conductor. Early life and education Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was born at 15 Theobalds Road, Holborn, London, in 1875 to Alice Hare Martin (1856–1953), an English woman, and Daniel Peter Hughes Taylor, a Krio man from Sierra Leone who had studied medic ...
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Bob Cole (composer)
Robert Allen Cole Jr. (July 1, 1868 – August 2, 1911) was an American composer, actor, playwright, and stage producer and director. In collaboration with Billy Johnson, he wrote and produced ''A Trip to Coontown'' (1898), the first musical entirely created and owned by black showmen. The popular song ''La Hoola Boola'' (1898) was also a result of their collaboration. Cole later partnered with brothers J. Rosamond Johnson, pianist and singer, and James Weldon Johnson, pianist, guitarist and lawyer, creating more than 200 songs. Their vaudeville act featured classical piano pieces and their musicals featured sophisticated lyrics without the usual stereotypes such as "hot-mamas" and watermelons. Success enabled Cole and Rosamond to tour America and Europe with their act. The trio's most popular songs were " Louisiana Lize" and "Under the Bamboo Tree" (1901?). Their more successful musicals were '' The Shoo-Fly Regiment'' (1906) and '' The Red Moon'' (1908, written without Weldon ...
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Billy Childs
William Edward Childs (born March 8, 1957) is an award-winning American composer, jazz pianist, arranger and conductor from Los Angeles, California, United States. Early life When he was sixteen he attended the Community School of the Performing Arts sponsored by the University of Southern California. He studied music theory with Marienne Uszler and piano with John Weisenfluh. From 1975–'79 he attended the University of Southern California and received a degree in composition under the tutelage of Robert Linn. While still a teen, Childs was playing professionally and he made his recording debut in 1977 with the J. J. Johnson Quintet during a tour of Japan, documented as "the Yokohama Concert". He gained significant attention during the six years (1978–84) he spent in trumpeter Freddie Hubbard's group. His early influences as a pianist included Herbie Hancock, Keith Emerson, and Chick Corea and as a composer, Paul Hindemith, Maurice Ravel and Igor Stravinsky. Childs neverthele ...
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Samuel Coleridge-Taylor C
Samuel ''Šəmūʾēl'', Tiberian: ''Šămūʾēl''; ar, شموئيل or صموئيل '; el, Σαμουήλ ''Samouḗl''; la, Samūēl is a figure who, in the narratives of the Hebrew Bible, plays a key role in the transition from the biblical judges to the United Kingdom of Israel under Saul, and again in the monarchy's transition from Saul to David. He is venerated as a prophet in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In addition to his role in the Hebrew scriptures, Samuel is mentioned in Jewish rabbinical literature, in the Christian New Testament, and in the second chapter of the Quran (although Islamic texts do not mention him by name). He is also treated in the fifth through seventh books of ''Antiquities of the Jews'', written by the Jewish scholar Josephus in the first century. He is first called "the Seer" in 1 Samuel 9:9. Biblical account Family Samuel's mother was Hannah and his father was Elkanah. Elkanah lived at Ramathaim in the district of Zuph. His genealog ...
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Harry Burleigh
Henry Thacker ("Harry") Burleigh (December 2, 1866 – September 12, 1949) was an American classical composer, arranger, and professional singer known for his baritone voice. The first black composer who was instrumental in developing characteristically American music, Burleigh made black music available to classically trained artists both by introducing them to spirituals and by arranging spirituals in a more classical form. Burleigh also introduced Antonín Dvořák to Black American music, which influenced some of Dvořák's most famous compositions and led him to say that Black music would be the basis of an American classical music. Early and family life Henry Thacker Burleigh was born in Erie, Pennsylvania, in 1866 to Elizabeth Burleigh and Henry Thacker. His grandfather, Hamilton Waters, was granted manumission from slavery in Somerset County, Maryland, after paying $55 ($50 for him and $5 for his mother) in 1832 and receiving a certificate of freedom in 1835. Th ...
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James Tim Brymn
James Timothy Brymn (October 5, 1874 or 1881 – October 3, 1946) "Brymn, Lieutenant James Tim (1881-1946)", ''BlackPast.org''
Retrieved 7 October 2016
was an African-American conductor, , , and who generally performed northeastern hot style

Courtney Bryan (composer)
Courtney Bryan is an American composer and pianist whose work combines influences from jazz and gospel traditions. Early life and education Bryan was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. She obtained her Bachelor of Music from Oberlin College (2004), her Master of Music from Rutgers University (2007), and a Doctor of Musical Arts from Columbia University (2014), where her advisor was composer and trombonist George Lewis. Career Bryan is an assistant professor in the Newcomb College department of music at Tulane University, where she serves as Albert and Linda Mintz Professor of Music. Additionally, she serves as composer-in-residence for the Jacksonville Symphony. Awards * 2018: Alpert Awards in the Arts. * 2018: Hermitage Fellow * 2019: Bard College Freehand Fellow * 2019-20: Samuel Barber Rome Prize The Rome Prize is awarded by the American Academy in Rome, in Rome, Italy. Approximately thirty scholars and artists are selected each year to receive a study fellowship at t ...
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