Category: Roland Hayes
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The DNA of American Classical Music
While driving to Target to buy a new vacuum on Black Friday (oh, the glamorous life of an adjunct!), I turned on the radio to the classical station, which was in the middle of this piece, in a new arrangement for piano quintet (piano, two violins, viola, and cello). At first I thought it was…
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Classically Black, V: Playlists for “Playing Beethoven in the #BlackLivesMatter era” by Kira Thurman and”Home” by Langston Hughes
Read Kira Thurman’s article “Playing Beethoven in the #BlackLivesMatter Era” here (also in your course reading packet). Below you will find videos of the pieces Dr. Thurman references in her essay. 1. Johann Baptist Vanhal’s Concerto in D Major, which Kira Thurman imagines Draylen Mason playing: Two of the pieces Kira Thurman played for her…
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Classically Black, part II: The Songs of Black Volk Playlist
W.E.B. Du Bois (above), who spent several years studying in Germany in the 1890s, greatly admired German classical music, and considered it a repertoire full of freedom and possibility for black performers. He especially loved the operas of Richard Wagner (1813-1883), and in 1936 he made a pilgrimage to Bayreuth, the opera house in Bavaria…
From Spirituals to Hip Hop MUS 113 SUNY Broome 