Proquest Dissertations

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Zed) Road, Ann Aibor MI 48106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800/521-0600 NOTE TO USERS This reproduction is the best copy available UMI OLLY WILSON, ANTHONY DAVIS, AND GEORGE LEWIS: THE LIVES, WORKS, AND PERSPECTIVES OF THREE CONTEMPORARY AFRICAN AMERICAN COMPOSERS DM.A. DOCUMENT Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Musical Arts in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Robert Thomas Tanner, II, B.M., M M . ***** The Ohio State University 1999 D.M.A. Document Committee: Approved by Dr. Thomas Wells, Adviser Dr. Jan Radzynski '•'-"Adviser Dr. Arved Ashby School of Music UMI Number; 9931684 Copyright 1999 by Tanner, Robert Thomas, II Ail rights reserved. UMI Microform 9931684 Copyright 1999, by UMI Company. Ail rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. UMI 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, MI 48103 ©1999 Robert Tanner ABSTRACT The first part of this document explores the contributions made to music, research, and culture at large by three composers, OHy Wilson (b. 1937), Anthony Davis (b. 1951), and George Lewis (b. 1952). As aH three of these composers are Afiican Americans, their personal histories will be related to the larger history surrounding the development of music created and conceived by black people in America and the many issues that are brought to light in this music as compared to that of the dominant Anglo-Saxon culture in this country. In addition to determining a place in history for the three composers examined here, this document will also take on the ûrç)lications their careers have for other Afiican American composers as we enter the new millennium. The second part of the document is the score of the author’s composition. Reconstruction fo r Orchestra. u ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I wish, to extend my gratitude to my Heavenly Father and my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ for blessing me beyond measure throughout my educational career and for bringing me to this point as a scholar and as a person. I would like to thank my parents, Robert and Nancy Tanner, for their constant love and support throughout my life in my educational and personal pursuits. I thank Malaika Thompson, who has been my close companion throughout my doctoral program, and her family for their love, support, patience, and encouragement over the past three years. I thank all of my other family members and friends for continuing to be there for me throughout this long process. I also wish to thank the many students and performers I have worked with over the past few years for their support. To my adviser. Dr. Thomas Wells, and the rest of my doctoral committee, Dr. Jan Radzynski, and Dr. Arved Ashby, I thank you for your guidance and assistance in this project and throughout my program. Special thanks also to Dr. Daniel Avorgbedor for his insights and resources which have aided greatly in my research. In closing, I thank Oily Wilson, Anthony Davis, and George Lewis for their inspiration and for the awesome standard of excellence in their work and careers which I strive to emulate. m VTTA June 23, 1972............................................... Bom - Gallipolis, Ohio 1994..............................................................B.M. Music Industry, Capital University 1994 - 1996.................................................. Graduate Fellow The Ohio State University 1996..............................................................M.M. Music Composition 1996 - present .............................................. Graduate Teaching Associate The Ohio State University PUBLICATIONS Selected Compositions Nelson Park Suite (1992) “Witches Stew” (1993) “Y.R.U.” (1994) Ornaments for Percussion Ensemble (1995) “The Cotton Song” (1996) Courtship Dances (1996) Three Events fo r Woodwind Quintet (1997) Reconstruction fo r Orchestra (1998) Fanfare for Dr. King (1998) “New Someone” (1998) IV Romance fo r Alto Saxophone and Piano (1999) FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: Music TABLE OF CONTENTS EagÊ Abstract......................................................................................................................................ii Acknowledgments ....................................................................................................................iii Vita........................................................................................................................................... iv Chapters: 1. Introduction .....................................................................................................................1 2. OUyW^on ....................................................................................................................13 3. Anthony Davis ...............................................................................................................26 4. George Lewis................................................................................................................38 5. Conclusions ................................................................................................................... 52 Appendix: Scores, Recordings, and Internet Resources .........................................................................68 Bibliography.............................................................................................................................72 Reconstruction fo r Orchestra............................................................................................... 76 VI CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION “I am now satisfied that the future music of this country must be founded upon \\hat are called the negro melodies. This must he a real foundation of any serious and original school of composition to be developed in the LMted States. These are the fblk-songs o f America, and your composers must turn to them. All of the great Tmisidans have borrowed firom the songs o f the common people. ha the negro melodies o f America I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music. They are pathetic, tender, passionate, melancholy, solemn, religious, bold, merry, gay, or what you will.” ^ As we examine the contributions of Afiican American, composers at the end of this century, we are led to the above assessment given by Antonin Dvorak regarding the future of American music at the end of the last. It may indeed be natural to expect such an embrace of folk elements firom Dvorak (1841-1904), whose own compositional style was so thoroughly informed by the folk music of his native Bohemia. Yet, during his tenure as director of New York’s National Conservatory of Music fi*om 1892 to 1895, it was the potency and richness of music made by Afiican Americans which eventually manifested itself in Dvorak’s ninth symphony (‘Trom The New World”) and the “American” string quartet (Op. 96). In order to more fully understand the paths taken by conten^orary Afiican American composers OHy Wilson, Anthony Davis, and George Lewis, we must begin to understand ^ “Dvorak on Negro Melodies,”The Musical Record (Boston) (July 1893), 13, quoted in Eileen Southern, The Music of Black Americans: A History, 3rd ed. (New York: W. W. Norton, 1997), 267. 1 that potency and richness, and the circumstances which have fostered the evolution and flourishing of African American concert music over the past century. In doing so, we cannot ignore the social and cultural truths surrounding the presence of Afiican people in America and the effects of these realities on the collective psyche of Afiican Americans. From the time of the arrival of the first slaves to North America in the fifteenth century, people of Afiican descent have endured a hostile existence in this country. The mere nature of slavery alone validates this fact, but apart from that - and indeed, in part, because of it - there has been the constant proliferation of abuse, degradation, and legal mandates that have sought to brand all black people in America - slave and free - as inferior to members of the predominantly white ruling class. During slavery, this was achieved though the stripping of one’s religious beliefs,

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