Composers
Henry Thacker Burleigh
1866 - 1949About
H.T. Burleigh (1866-1949) is arguably the first prominent Black composer in America. Born in Erie, Pennsylvania, on 2 December 1866, Burleigh received his first music training from his mother. After discovering Burleigh's musical talent, Elizabeth Russell, a bank messenger who was his mother's employer, gave the youth a job as a doorman at the musicales she hosted in her home. This afforded Burleigh the opportunity to hear guest performers such as Teresa Carreño and Italo Campanini. Although he had no formal training, his talent as a singer led to employment as a soloist in several Erie churches and synagogues. In 1892, at the age of twenty-six, Burleigh received a scholarship (with some intervention in his behalf from Mrs. Frances MacDowell, mother of famed American composer Edward MacDowell) to the National Conservatory of Music in New York where he studied with Christian Fritsch, Rubin Goldmark, John White, and Max Spicker. The years Burleigh spent at the Conservatory greatly influenced his career, mostly due to his association and friendship with Antonín Dvorák, the Conservatory's director. After spending countless hours recalling and performing the African-American spirituals and plantation songs he had learned from his maternal grandfather for Dvorák, Burleigh was encouraged by the elder composer to preserve these melodies in his own compositions. In turn, Dvorák's use of the spirituals "Goin' Home" and "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" in his Symphony no. 9 in E minor ("From the New World") was probably influenced by his sessions with Burleigh. In addition, Burleigh served as copyist for Dvorák, a task that prepared him for his future responsibilities as a music editor. In 1900, Burleigh was the first African-American chosen as soloist at Temple Emanu-El, a New York synagogue, and by 1911 he was working as an editor for music publisher G. Ricordi. His success was enhanced through the publication of several of his compositions, including "Ethiopia Saluting the Colors", a collection entitled Jubilee Songs of the USA, and his arrangement of "Deep River", for which he is best remembered. The widespread success of his setting of Deep River inspired the publication of nearly a dozen more spirituals the same year, his spiritual arrangements became increasingly popular with concert soloists, and a tradition of concluding concerts with a set of spirituals was established. Burleigh's achievement in solo vocal writing is best represented by his original song cycles, Saracen Songs , Passionale, and Five Songs of Laurence Hope, considered by many to be his finest work. His instrumental output includes the unpublished Six Plantation Melodies for violin and piano, From the Southland for piano, and Southland Sketches for violin and piano. test.
Related Information
http://memory.loc.gov/diglib/ihas/loc.natlib.ihas.200035730/default.htmlWorks by Henry Thacker Burleigh
Title | Collection | Voice Type | Range | Poet |
---|---|---|---|---|
Lovely Dark and Lonely One | Voice | C4 - G5 | Bb3 - F5 | Langston Hughes | |
Ma lawd's a-writin' down time | The Plantation Melodies Old and New | Voice | C4 - F5 | R. E. Phillips |
Malay Boat Song | Medium | C4 - F5 | Laurence Hope | |
Memory | Medium | C4 - D5 | Arthur Symons | |
My Lord What A Mornin' | The Spirituals of Burleigh | High | F4 - F5 | Db4 - Db5 | Biblical |
My Merlindy Brown | The Plantation Melodies Old and New | Medium | C4 - F5 | James Edwin Campbell |
My Ways Cloudy | The Spirituals of Burleigh | High | Db4 - Eb5 | Biblical |
Myrra | Medium | C4 - Eb5 | ||
Negro Lullaby | The Plantation Melodies Old and New | Medium | C4 - F5 | James Edwin Campbell |
Nobody Knows De Trouble I've Seen | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | Eb4 - Eb5 | C4 - C5 | Biblical |
Now Sleeps The Crimson Petal | Voice | A3 - D5 | W. Tennyson | |
O Love of A Day | Medium | Eb4 - Eb5 | Randolph Hartley | |
O Perfect Love | Voice | B3 - F5 | D. F. Blomfield | |
O Rocks, Don't Fall On Me | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | F4 - F5 | D4 - D5 | Biblical |
O Why Art Thou Not Near Me | Medium | Bb3 - Eb5 | ||
O, Night of Dream and Wonder (Almona's Song) | The Saracen Songs | High | Db4 - F5 | Fred G. Bowles |
Oh Peter Go Ring-A Dem Bells | The Spirituals of Burleigh | High | C4 - F5 | Biblical |
Oh Wasn't That A Wide Ribber | The Spirituals of Burleigh | High | Eb4 - Eb5 | Biblical |
Oh! Rock Me, Julie | Negro Folk Songs (Not Spirituals) | Medium | G3 - F#5 | H.E. Krehbiel |
Oh, Didn't It Rain? | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | F4 - F5 | Optional Bb5, D4 - D5 | Optional G5 | Genisis 7:4 |
Oh, My Love | High | G4 - Bb5 | Harriet Gaylord | |
On Inishmaan: Isles of Aran | Medium | Bb3 - D5 | Arthur Symons | |
One Day | Voice | C4 - F5 | Mary Blackwell Sterling | |
One Year | Medium | Db4 - Eb5 | Margaret M. Harlan | |
Perhaps | Medium | C4 - D5 | Louise Alston Burleigh | |
Promis' Lan' (A Hallelujah Song) | Medium | C4 - Db5 | Mrs. N.J. Corey | |
Request | Medium | C4 - F5 | Laurence Hope | |
Ride On, King Jesus | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | D4 - D5, Optional F#5 | D4 - D5, Optional F#5 | Psalms 45:4; Revlations 6:2 |
Ring, my bawnjer, ring | Two Plantation Songs | Medium | F4 - Eb5 | James E. Campbell |
Run to Jesus | Medium | C4 - C5 | ||
Saviour Divine | Medium | C4 - F5 | R. Palmer | |
Scandalize' My Name | Negro Folk Songs (Not Spirituals) | Medium | F4 - Eb5 | |
Since Molly Went Away | Medium | C4 - D5 | Frank L. Stanton | |
Sinner, Please Doan Let Dis Harves' Pass | The Spirituals of Burleigh | High | E4 - E5 | Biblical |
Sleep, Li'l Chile, Go Sleep! | Medium | B3 - E5 | George V. Hobart | |
Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | E4 - E5 | A4 - A5 | Biblical |
Somewhere | Medium | E4 - G#5 | James Whedon | |
Stan' Still Jordan | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | G4 - G5 | C4 - C5 | Biblical |
Steal Away | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | A4 - F5 | F4 - D5 | Biblical |
Swing Low, Sweet Chariot | The Spirituals of Burleigh | Low, High | Eb4 - Eb5 | C4 - C5 | II Kings 2, 11 |
Tarry with me, O my Saviour | Medium | Db4 - F5 | C.L. Smith | |
Tell Me Once More | Medium | F4 - F5 | Fred G. Bowles | |
The Absent-Minded Beggar | Medium | D4 - F5 | Rudyard Kipling | |
The Dove and the Lily | Voice | E4 - G5 | Sweedish Folk Song | |
The Dream Love | Medium | Db4 - Ab5 | Alexander Groves | |
The Glory of the Day was in Her Face | Passionale | Tenor | E4 - G5 | James Weldon Johnson |
The Gray Wolf | Voice | Bb3 - G5 | Arthur Symons | |
The Hour Glass | Medium | Alexander Groves | ||
The Jungle Flower | Five Songs of Lawrence Hope | Voice | F4 - F5 | Lawrence Hope |
The Little House of Dreams | Medium | Ab4 - Gb5 | Arthur Wallace Peach |