Hall Johnson's Choral and Dramatic Works
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Performing Negro Folk Culture, Performing America: Hall Johnson’s Choral and Dramatic Works (1925-1939) The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Wittmer, Micah. 2016. Performing Negro Folk Culture, Performing America: Hall Johnson’s Choral and Dramatic Works (1925-1939). Doctoral dissertation, Harvard University, Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:26718725 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA Performing Negro Folk Culture, Performing America: Hall Johnson’s Choral and Dramatic Works (1925-1939) A dissertation presented by Micah Wittmer To The Department of Music in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the subject of Music Harvard University Cambridge, Massachusetts January, 2016 © 2016, Micah Wittmer All rights reserved. Dissertation Advisor: Professor Carol J. Oja Micah Wittmer -- Performing Negro Folk Culture, Performing America: Hall Johnson’s Choral and Dramatic Works (1925-1939) Abstract This dissertation explores the portrayal of Negro folk culture in concert performances of the Hall Johnson Choir and in Hall Johnson’s popular music drama, Run, Little Chillun. I contribute to existing scholarship on Negro spirituals by tracing the performances of these songs by the original Fisk Jubilee singers in 1867 to the Hall Johnson Choir’s performances in the 1920s-1930s, with a specific focus on the portrayal of Negro folk culture. By doing so, I show how the meaning and importance of performing Negro folk culture changed over time during this period. My dissertation also draws on Hall Johnson’s lectures, radio broadcasts, and published essays on Negro folk culture. By tracing the performance of the Negro spirituals to those of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers during the Reconstruction period, it becomes clear that without the path-breaking work of the original Fisk Jubilee Singers, there would be no Hall Johnson Choir. Hall Johnson was devoted to composing works about African Americans that preserved and accurately portrayed Negro folk culture because he believed that Negro folk culture was an essential part of American cultural identity. I posit that Run, Little Chillun employs the ideals of the New Negro Renaissance, strategically capitalizing on what many white American cultural critics believed to be primitive—and therefore genuine—black culture while promoting a unique version of black empowerment through the speech of an Oxford Educated black male character who espoused an Afrofuturistic theology. With an interdisciplinary approach, I draw on musicology, African American studies, and sociology to place Hall Johnson’s writings on Negro spirituals within the context of the greater discussion of Negro spirituals during the 1920s-1940s. My primary iii methodology is historical and includes archival research, musical analysis, and reception history. The writings of black intellectuals and leaders of the New Negro Renaissance such as W.E.B Du Bois, Alain Locke, William Work, and John Rosamond Johnson provide the primary theoretical framework for this dissertation. iv Contents List of Examples, Figures and Tables .......................................................................................... vii Acknowledgements ...................................................................................................................... viii Introduction: Making up Our Minds about what to do with Negro Folk Culture ......................... 1 Negro Folk Music ................................................................................................................................ 6 Other Aspects of Negro Folk Culture ............................................................................................ 12 Authenticity ......................................................................................................................................... 14 The Influence of Harlem Renaissance Patrons ............................................................................. 16 Art versus Propaganda ...................................................................................................................... 19 Literature Review and Methodology ............................................................................................... 20 Overview of Chapters ....................................................................................................................... 26 Chapter I Constructing and Performing Authentic Negro Folk Culture: The Legacy of the Negro Spirituals from the Fisk Jubilee Singers to the Hall Johnson Choir ... 29 Part I: Performing the “Reconstructed” New Negro The Role of the Fisk Jubilee Singers in Establishing Negro Folk Culture as American Culture ............................................................................................................................ 34 Part II: The Importance of the Negro Spirituals to the Changing Definition of the New Negro (1890s-1920s) .............................................................................................................. 46 The Negro Spiritual and Folk Nationalism ............................................................. 47 The Evolution of the New Negro from the Great Migration to 1925 ............... 53 The New Negro of the Harlem Renaissance .......................................................... 57 Reclaiming Negro Spirituals in 1925 ........................................................................ 61 Maintaining the “folk quality” of Negro Spirituals in performances by New Negro musicians .......................................................................................................... 61 Part III: The Hall Johnson Choir: Creating an image of Authenticity and Singing the Ideals of the New Negro ............. 68 “Like an Old-Fashioned Negro Camp Meeting”: The Marketing and Reception of The Hall Johnson Choir........................................................................................ 74 Promoting “Authenticity” in Hall Johnson Choir Publicity Literature .............. 78 Johnson’s Authenticity Narrative ............................................................................. 80 Defining the “true Negro spiritual” ......................................................................... 86 Performance Practices of the Hall Johnson Choir and the Fisk Jubilee Singers ....................................................................................................................................... 91 Conclusion ................................................................................................................... 94 v Chapter 2 Dramatizing the Negro Spiritual, Dramatizing the Folk: The 1933 Production of Hall Johnson’s Run, Little Chillun ......................................................... 97 Part I: The Script of Run, Little Chillun and Johnson’s Religious Journey ................. 101 Africanisms and New Negro Ideals in the Theology and Music of the New Day Pilgrims ....................................................................................................................... 106 The New Day Pilgrims and Johnson’s Spiritual Quest ....................................... 114 Portraying Africanisms in Negro folk culture: Dance in the New Day Pilgrim Scene ........................................................................................................................... 120 Portraying the Christianity of Negro Folk Culture .............................................. 129 Part II: The Origins of Run, Little Chillun and its Cultural Climate ............................ 137 Is Run, Little Chillun on the “Art” or “Propaganda” side of the New Negro Art versus Propaganda Debate? .................................................................................... 142 Part III: Primitivism Perceived as Authenticity in Run, Little Chillun ........................ 150 Run, Little Chillun’s Audiences and the Exercise of “Seeing Ourselves as Others See Us” ....................................................................................................................... 153 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 157 Chapter 3 A People’s Drama: The Federal Theater Project Production of Run, Little Chillun ................................................. 159 The Federal Theatre Project: Plays “of, by, and for the American People” .... 162 Setting the Stage for Run, Little Chillun: ................................................................. 166 Plays produced by the Los Angeles FTP Prior to 1938 ...................................... 166 Works by Black Playwrights Overlooked by the Los Angeles FTP .................. 173 The Los Angeles Negro Unit Production of Run, Little Chillun......................... 178 Critic’s Responses to The New Day Pilgrims in 1938 ........................................ 181 Conclusion ................................................................................................................. 185 Epilogue ......................................................................................................................................