Composer Robert Nathaniel Dett, who lived until 1943, was a collector and preserver of spirituals, and he saw the music as a rich and artistic source of melody for American music. When he heard the music of Antonín Dvořák and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor for the first time, Dett was drawn to the way their melodies reminded him of the spirituals his grandmother, a former enslaved woman, had sung to him. Here's what he said about it:
We have this wonderful store of folk music—the melodies of an enslaved people … But this store will be of no value unless we utilize it, unless we treat it in such manner that it can be presented in choral form, in lyric and operatic works, in concertos and suites and salon music, … music which will prove that we, too, have national feelings and characteristics, as have the European peoples whose forms we have zealously followed for so long.
Musical selections from Robert Nathaniel Dett
In the Bottoms
In the Bottoms is a piano suite consisting of five movements. Each movement in the suite includes expressions of African American folk songs, portraying unique scenes from the Black community in the American South’s River Bottoms region.
Son of Mary
Originally published by the John Church Co. in 1926, this song is based on a traditional Negro melody from Dett’s collection.
The Ordering of Moses
This oratorio is a retelling of Moses leading his people to the promised land. It was premiered in 1937 by the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and May Festival Chorus, but broadcast never finished due to technical difficulties.
Credits
Host: Tesfa Wondemagegnehu
Producer: Dan Nass
Writers: Andrea Blain and Scott Blankenship
Executive Producer: Julie Amacher
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About Rhapsody in Black
Where we turn up the voices of Black artists in the world of classical music, with host Vernon Neal.
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