The Life and Solo Vocal Works of Margaret Allison Bonds (1913-1972) Alethea N
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Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2013 The Life and Solo Vocal Works of Margaret Allison Bonds (1913-1972) Alethea N. Kilgore Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF MUSIC THE LIFE AND SOLO VOCAL WORKS OF MARGARET ALLISON BONDS (1913-1972) By ALETHEA N. KILGORE A Treatise submitted to the College of Music in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Music Degree Awarded: Fall Semester, 2013 Copyright © 2013 Alethea N. Kilgore All Rights Reserved Alethea N. Kilgore defended this treatise on September 20, 2013. The members of the supervisory committee were: Wanda Brister Rachwal Professor Directing Treatise Matthew Shaftel University Representative Timothy Hoekman Committee Member Marcía Porter Committee Member The Graduate School has verified and approved the above-named committee members, and certifies that the treatise has been approved in accordance with university requirements. ii This treatise is dedicated to the music and memory of Margaret Allison Bonds. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would first like to acknowledge the faculty of the Florida State University College of Music, including the committee members who presided over this treatise: Dr. Wanda Brister Rachwal, Dr. Timothy Hoekman, Dr. Marcía Porter, and Dr. Matthew Shaftel. I would also like to thank Dr. Louise Toppin, Director of the Vocal Department of University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for assisting me in this research by providing manuscripts of Bonds’s solo vocal works. She graciously invited me to serve as a lecturer and performer at A Symposium of Celebration: Margaret Allison Bonds (1913-1972) and the Women of Chicago on March 2-3, 2013. This event was sponsored by Videmus in collaboration with University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina Central University. I would also like to thank Florida A & M University for contributing to this lecture and performance by providing a faculty grant which allowed pianist Professor Lindsey Sarjeant and me to participate in this conference. I would also like to acknowledge Dr. Darryl Taylor, Associate Professor of Voice at University of California, Irvine and founder of the African-American Art Song Alliance, for providing a wealth of information on Margaret Bonds which helped me to begin this journey in 2009. I would like to thank James V. Hatch for granting me permission to publish quotes from the interview he conducted with Margaret Bonds in Los Angeles in December of 1971. I would like to extend another special thanks to Margaret Bonds’s friend, soprano Charlotte Holloman, who also assisted me in this research by agreeing to do an interview on Christmas Eve of 2011. Holloman is currently retired from Howard University in Washington D. C., where she served as a full-time lecturer, music instructor, and the Coordinator of Voice Performance Programs and Studies since 1995. Another measure of gratitude goes to the many people who assisted me in this research. In Chicago, I would like to thank Janet Harper, Reference and Outreach Librarian, Suzanne Flandreau, Head Librarian and Archivist Emeritus, and Laurie Lee Moses, Archivist and Digital Librarian at the Center for Black Music Research at Columbia College Chicago and Janet Olsen, Assistant University Archivist at the Northwestern University Archives. In New York, I would like to thank Jane Gottlieb, Vice President for Library and Information Resources, Graduate Studies, of the Lila Acheson Wallace Library and Archives at the Juilliard School and Diana Lachatanere, Curator, Manuscripts, Archives, and Rare Books Division Assistant Director for Collections and Services at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library. I would also like to thank Thomas Lisanti, Manager, Rights and Permissions at The New York Public Library and Antony Toussaint of the Photograph and Prints Division of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, The New York Public Library, for the digital photographs. I would also like to extend an additional thank you to Northwestern University Archives for the photographs and newspaper clippings. Other special thanks to The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, Yale Beinecke Rare Books and Archives Library, and Library of Congress. I would also like to thank Dr. Carlos Vega, Assistant Professor of Saxophone Studies at Florida A & M University, for type-setting nearly all of the musical excerpts found in this document so that portions of Bonds’s solo vocal works could be shared. Finally, I would like to acknowledge my family, loved ones, and my students and colleagues at Florida A & M University. Thank you. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Musical Examples ............................................................................................................ viii List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... xii Abstract ........................................................................................................................................ xiii 1. INTRODUCTION .....................................................................................................................1 Margaret Allison Bonds .............................................................................................................1 2. BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION .........................................................................................4 The Chicago Years: The Pre-College Years (1913-1929) .........................................................4 Early Education ....................................................................................................................6 Abbie Mitchell and Will Marion Cook ................................................................................7 William Levi Dawson ..........................................................................................................8 Florence Beatrice Price ........................................................................................................9 The Chicago Years: Northwestern University (1929-1934) ....................................................10 Katherine Dunham and William Grant Still ......................................................................13 Margaret Bonds and Ned Rorem .......................................................................................14 The Chicago Years: Post Northwestern University (1934-1939) ............................................16 The Allied Arts Academy ..................................................................................................17 The New York Years: 1939-1967 ............................................................................................18 The Juilliard School ...........................................................................................................19 Djane Richardson ...............................................................................................................20 Robert Starer ......................................................................................................................22 Charlotte Holloman ............................................................................................................22 The Los Angeles Years: 1967-1972 ........................................................................................26 3. THE ELEMENTS OF BONDS’S SOLO VOCAL STYLE AND THE AFRICAN-AMERICAN SPIRITUAL ARRANGEMENTS .........................................29 Musical Style ...........................................................................................................................29 The African-American Spiritual as a Primary Influence .........................................................30 Historical Background .......................................................................................................30 The African-American Spiritual Arrangements of Margaret Bonds .......................................34 The Commissions of Leontyne Price .................................................................................35 4. THE JAZZ AND MUSICAL THEATRE SONGS .................................................................50 The Jazz Songs .........................................................................................................................50 Andy Razaf ........................................................................................................................51 Harold Dickinson ...............................................................................................................54 The Musical Theatre Songs .....................................................................................................56 Introduction ........................................................................................................................56 Robert Dunsmore and Malone Dickerson................................................................................56 Romey and Julie (1936) .....................................................................................................56 v Langston Hughes and Arna Bontemps ....................................................................................57 Tropics After Dark (1940)