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Black Violin Links
Black Violin Links
Famous Black Violinists in the 1700s and 1800s
A LIST WITH INTERNET RESOURCES
Compiled by Gayle Dixon
Famous Black Violinists
Afro European and African American Violinists
of the 18th and 19th Centuries
The Afro Europeans
During the 18th and 19th centuries, a number of Black Europeans earned acclaim as concert violinists and composers:
Black Violinists in Europe
Joseph Boulogne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges (1745-1799)
Born in the West Indies colony of Guadaloupe, Le Chevalier de Saint-Georges was the son of a French aristocrat and a Black slave woman from Senegal. He was raised and educated as an aristocrat in France, where he was a swordsman to the king. Saint-Georges became known as "the Black Mozart." Several of his compositions have been recorded in recent years.
L'Association "Le Concert de Monsieur de Saint-George" website has a catalog of his works, list of recordings, sound-clips and links to other sites.
TheMozartForum offers an interesting account of his life
Joseph Antonio Emidy (1775(?) -1835)
Joseph Antonio Emidy was born in Guinea, West Africa. As a child he was sold into slavery and shipped to Brazil. Emidy was later taken to Portugal, where he received violin lessons. After three or four years of study there, Emidy gained a position as a second violinist at the Lisbon Opera (1794). Unfortunately, his skill as a violinist also led to the loss of his freedom: after a performance one evening, Emidy was kidnapped onto a British navy warship to serve as "ship's fiddler." He was released in Falmouth, Cornwall about four years later. Emidy remained in England, where he married and raised a family in the city of Truro, Cornwall. He is buried at Kelwyn Church, Cornwall.
Emidy was well known in Cornwall as a violinist, conductor, teacher, and organizer of orchestral societies. He is said tto have composed chamber works, concertos and symphonies, but none of his music survives.
British Association for Local History: Event in 2007 honored Emidy and commemorated the bicentennial of the end of British involvement in the Atlantic slave trade.
Details of Emidy's life are found in the autobiography of politician James Silk Buckingham (London, 1855). Buckingham played flute and studied music with Emidy. Find this at JSTOR:
Bridgetower was the son of an African father and Polish mother. He was a recognized child prodigy who made his debut in Paris in 1789. He studied with Haydn and was a friend of Beethoven, even giving the first performance of Beethoven's "Kreutzer" Sonata, in Vienna in 1803. Bridgetower composed many works.
Mellen Press: Biography of Bridgetower by Dr. Clifford D. Panton.
The British Online Gallery feature The Black Europeans includes biographies of George Polgreen Bridgetower, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor and other Afro Europeans.
Chevalier J.J.O. de Meude-Monpas (18th c)
Very little information survives about the mysterious Chevalier, other than his music and books. Meude-Monpas studied music in Paris. He wrote six violin concertos and a dictionary of music (1787).
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was born in London. His father was from Sierra Leone and his mother was English. He studied violin at the Royal College of Music. Coleridge-Taylor enjoyed immense popularity in England and made quite a sensation among African Americans, who during this period just fifty years after the end of slavery, took great pride in his accomplishments. In Washington DC, a Coleridge-Taylor Choral Society was founded to perform his work. He was received by President Theodore Roosevelt. Many of his compositions are based on African, Native American and African American themes.
In 1997, American concert violinist Rachel Barton Pine recorded Black Composers of the 18th and 19th Century (Cedille CDR 90000 035), which includes concertos by Chevalier de Saint-Georges, Chevalier de Meude-Monpas, Joseph White, and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.
The Americas produced many outstanding Black musicians during the 19th century, some of whom travelled to Europe to pursue careers in classical music. Musical life in the Caribbean and in South America was especially vibrant:
The Afro Cubans
Claudio José Dominongo Brindis de Salas (1852 - 1911)
A famed Cuban violinist, his father was a conductor and his brother a violinist. De Salas concertized throughout Europe. Known as "the Black Paganini," he was decorated with the French Legion of Honor. His last concert in Cuba was given in 1901. He then sank into obscurity, dying in poverty in Buenos Aires.
Black Cuba website features accounts of de Salas and José White:
Joseph White had the good fortune to perform with New Orleans pianist Louis Moreau Gottschalk, America's first international concert artist. Gottschalk encouraged White, raising money for him to go to Europe. White trained at the Paris Conservatory. In Europe from 1855 to 1875, he distinguished himself as a concert violinist and composer. In 1876, White appeared as soloist with the orchestra which later became the NY Philharmonic, performing the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto in e minor, op.64.
When the floodgates of freedom began to open in America, Black musicians ventured out from the Deep South into the big cities, where new forms of music were born. Black string players played a crucial role in the creation of American music:
Francis "Frank" Johnson (1792-1844)
Francis Johnson was a celebrated Philadelphia composer and bandleader. Primarily known as a bugler, Johnson also performed on the violin. Born in Martinique, West Indies, Johnson moved to Philadelphia around 1809. Abolitionists in that city had created an atmosphere where many Black people lived in relative freedom. The publication of Johnson's Collection of New Cottillions, about 1818, brought widespread notice. He developed a school of Black musicians, and was the first to give formal band concerts. By the 1820s, Johnson was a successful leader of bands, and dance orchestras for which his musicians substituted string instruments. He toured the nation with his band, and was the first American to take an ensemble to Europe. He is often cited as the first African American to have his music published, and the first to participate in integrated concerts.
In the 1830s, violinist Deburque was an organizer of the Negro Philharmonic Society of New Orleans (another city where many Blacks lived in freedom). The orchestra had over 100 members. White musicians performed with the ensemble on occasion, when special instrumentations were required. Deburque was orchestra director at the Theatre de la Renaissance, and a music teacher.
The great orator, statesman and freedom fighter played the violin, as did his son and grandson. Douglass is a subject of biographical record in Rev. William J. Simmons' work, Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive and Rising. Pub. 1887, Cleveland, Ohio, by Geo. M. Rewell Co.
New Orleans-born DéDé was the son of free Black West Indian parents. He studied violin and composition at Paris Conservatory, and settled in Bordeaux, France. About 1868, he became director of L'Alcazar Theater Orchestra. He gave a number of concerts in New Orleans in 1893-4.
Williams was a violinist, arranger and music teacher, and after Frank Johnson, the best known Black composer of the period. He was known to perform on many instruments. Williams is a subject of biographical record in Rev. William J. Simmons' work, Men of Mark: Eminent, Progressive and Rising. Pub. 1887, Cleveland, Ohio, by Geo. M. Rewell Co. Find this book (page 288) at the University of North Carolina website, Documenting the American South.
Was a concert violinist who is thought to have gone abroad to study. He settled in New York in the late 1860s, and concertized extensively during the 1870s. He was considered "one of the greatest musicians of the race." Like most musicians of this era he could not earn a living as a concert violinist, so he toured with minstrel companies and led a string ensemble which played for society events. Considered the first African American to compose an opera, his work The Virginia Ball was registered at the US Copyright Office in 1868, however the music has been lost. He maintained a teaching studio where he befriended and taught David Mannes, later to become concertmaster of the NY Symphony Orchestra. In memory of his teacher, Mannes later founded "a music school for colored students" in NY.
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Walter F. Craig (1854 - 1920)
Craig, known as "The Prince of Negro Violinists," was the first Black musician to be admitted to the Musician's Mutual Protective Union, in NYC. His debut recital was given in 1870 at the Cooper Union. Craig's Celebrated Orchestra, a society dance orchestra, was organized in 1872. For over 25 years, he held annual receptions where music of Black composers, as well as standard repertoire, was performed. Craig was known as a composer and arranger, and performed throughout the eastern states. He provided employment for many Black musicians, and performed with his string quartet from about 1889. The NY Herald Tribune called him "a perfect master of his instrument." There is an account of his career in Men of Mark, Eminent, Progressive and Rising, by Rev. William J. Simmons (page 451) at the University of North Carolina website, Documenting the American South.
While his grandfather and father were amateur violinists, this grandson of Frederick Douglass became a noted concert artist who toured the USA and Europe for three decades. In 1914 he became the first violinist ever to record for Victor Talking Machine Company, however those recordings were never released.
Endnotes
Solomon Northrup (1808 - ?)
Violinist Northrup was born a free man in upstate NY. His reputation as a violinist gained him steady employment at social events. Northrup's simple life as a laborer, violinist and family man was violently interrupted in 1841, when he accepted work in Washington DC from two men who kidnapped and sold him into slavery. When Northrup regained his freedom in 1853, the wife of his master was brought to tears because she would no longer hear his violin playing. Northrup's journal, Twelve Years a Slave, was a sensation at the time, but he lived the remainder of his life in obscurity in Glens Falls, NY.
At University of North CarolinaDocumenting the American South, you can read Solomon's narrative:
Solomon Northrup's Odyssey is a film directed by Gordon Parks (1984). Written by Lou Potter and Samm-Art Williams, it was made for television. Starring Avery Brooks and Rhetta Greene. Produced by Yanna Kroyt Brandt for PAST AMERICA, INC. Available on DVD.
Recommended Reading
Southern, Eileen. The Music of Black Americans: A History.
