Clarence Cameron White
| Clarence Cameron White | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Background information | |
| Born |
August 10, 1880 Clarksville, Tennessee, United States |
| Died | June 30, 1960 (aged 79) New York, New York, United States |
| Genres | classical music |
| Occupation(s) | composer, violinist, educator |
| Years active | 1901-1960 |
Clarence Cameron White (August 10, 1880 – June 30, 1960) was an African-American neoromantic composer and concert violinist. Dramatic works by the composer were his best-known, such as the incidental music for the play Tambour and the opera Ouanga. During the first decades of the twentieth century, White was considered the foremost violinist of his race. He was a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity.
Born in Clarksville, Tennessee to James W. White, a doctor and school principal, and Jennie Scott White, a violinist who studied at Oberlin Conservatory of Music. His father died when he was only two years old. White relocated with his mother and younger brother to Oberlin, Ohio to live with her parents, where he was first exposed to the violin:
My mother took me to hear The Messiah sung at the conservatory and I came away humming snatches of it. Mother thought I had a good musical ear and persuaded my grandfather, who was a religious man, to give me his violin...I was only six at the time, nevertheless, my grandfather pouted, "I'll give him the violin. But if he ever plays at a dance I'll take it back."
In 1890, Mrs. White remarried and White relocated with his family to Washington D.C., whose black communities had rich and active music scenes. Two years later, White met the violinist and composer Will Marion Cook, resulting from White falling asleep during Cook's recital:
One evening my mother took me to hear the pupils of Mrs. Alice Strange Davis, the most renowned piano teacher in Washington...I was especially anxious to hear Will Marion Cook play the violin. He...was to play a number toward the end of the program. As usual a program by pupils is rather a long-drawn-out affair, so by the time for Cook's number I had fallen asleep. I was awakened by a tremendous applause after his solo. When I was told that he had played I burst out crying and made such a fuss that my mother had to hustle me out of the concert and I went home in disgrace.
Cook inquired about the upset young boy and offered to give White violin lessons in the summer of 1892, an experience that had a profound effect on White: "Every lesson was one of pure joy, and it was during this period that I definitely made up my mind to be a violinist."
White continued his private studies in 1894 with Joseph Douglass, another notable black violinist and grandson of abolitionist Frederick Douglass, at Howard University. He attended Oberlin Conservatory of Music 1896–1901, the alma mater of his parents, where he studied with Frederick Doolittle, Cook's former violin teacher. White left in 1901 before graduating to accept a teaching position in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania that fell through after one month. Shortly thereafter he won a violin scholarship through the Hartford School of Music where he studied with Franz Micki.
...
Wikipedia