John Michael Cooper
A FLORENCE PRICE POSTHUMOUS PREMIERE
Moods for Flute, Clarinet, and Piano at the International Florence Price Festival NO ONE has been more assiduous about ensuring that the...
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John Michael Cooper
Oct 5, 20232 min read
The Tombstone’s Tale (2)
This post is an update to my post of March 26, 2023. As I noted there, in 1912, two years after the death of Dr. James H. Smith, father...
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John Michael Cooper
Jul 15, 20239 min read
RIDDLED WITH MISTAKES
In the last few years, a music-publishing industry that historically has resolutely ignored compositions by composers of color and women...
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John Michael Cooper
Jun 26, 20235 min read
RACISM IN ROMANTIC MUSIC (4): CANONICAL SILENCING, AND SOME CONCLUSIONS
As a prefatory exercise for this post, consider the “rule of 4%”: less than four percent of the players in professional orchestras with...
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John Michael Cooper
Jun 23, 20237 min read
RRM – RACISM IN ROMANTIC MUSIC (Part 1 of 4)
Dear Constant Reader, I’ve been absent from this blog for a while, partly because I needed to recharge, partly because I’m currently...
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John Michael Cooper
Mar 26, 20234 min read
THE TOMBSTONE’S TALE
The Mother of Florence B. Price The tombstone (a marker, really) is in Achor, Columbiana County, Ohio. On it is the name of Florence...
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John Michael Cooper
Jan 20, 20236 min read
A COMPOSITIONAL COLLABORATION(?) BETWEEN MARGARET BONDS AND FLORENCE PRICE
Sleep Song (text by Joyce Kilmer) Have you ever been in a crowd or out in public and heard a voice that you immediately recognize, even...
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John Michael Cooper
Jan 7, 20236 min read
JOLLY JINKS WITH FLORENCE PRICE
Twenty Years Down the Road, a Great Composer Revisits an Early Work and Asks, “What’s in a Name?” There aren’t many students of...
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John Michael Cooper
Dec 20, 20223 min read
FLORENCE PRICE’S MOTHER AND FATHER SUED THE RAILROAD FOR DISCRIMINATION
Speaking Truth to Power In the late nineteenth century, the railroads were the primary means for shipping goods and materials quickly,...
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John Michael Cooper
Dec 12, 20222 min read
A MEMORIAL PERFORMANCE FOR FLORENCE B. PRICE
The Second Violin Concerto in 1953 It’s generally said that Florence Price’s moving and innovative Second Violin Concerto was premiered...
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John Michael Cooper
Jun 3, 20222 min read
FLORENCE PRICE’S SCENES OF TENEMENT LIFE
Today witnesses the release of 2022’s second[1] milestone in the recorded legacy of Florence B. Price: the world-premiere recording of...
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John Michael Cooper
Mar 19, 20223 min read
THE WORLD PREMIERE OF FLORENCE PRICE’S FIRST CHORAL-ORCHESTRAL COMPOSITION
The Song of Hope sounds at Ithaca College under the baton of Michael Stern [This post is occasioned by the world première of Florence B....
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John Michael Cooper
Mar 11, 20224 min read
JUDGEMENT DAY:
A Gospel Song by Florence Price and Langston Hughes Gets a Belated First Recording Popular exclamations about the trove of Florence Price...
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John Michael Cooper
Feb 4, 20224 min read
CELEBRATING A FLORENCE PRICE COMPOSITION THAT DIDN’T WIN
Lady Jess and Ric’key Pageot Record the Recently Published Andante con espressione for Violin and Piano The Summer of 1926 was important...
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John Michael Cooper
Jan 15, 20222 min read
A CLASSICAL BENEFIT RECITAL FEATURING “NEW” MUSIC BY FLORENCE B. PRICE
Pianist Josh Tatsuo Cullen revives a noble tradition with newly published music Students of music history know that until World War I...
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John Michael Cooper
Jan 13, 20225 min read
THE VIOLIN AS STORYTELLER
Florence Price's Chamber Works for Violin and Piano When Florence B. Price graduated from the New England Conservatory in 1906, she held...
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John Michael Cooper
Jan 2, 20222 min read
THE FIRST LIVE RECORDING OF AN AFRO-MODERNIST “COTTON DANCE” (ca. 1940) BY FLORENCE B. PRICE
performed by Michael Lu On New Year’s Eve of the rough-and-tumble year 2021 I got a fabulous musical surprise – 365 days late. The...
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John Michael Cooper
Aug 28, 20214 min read
FLORENCE PRICE V. LANGSTON HUGHES AT THE “FEET O’ JESUS”
Langston Hughes’s relationship with the Christian church was . . . complicated. Except that it wasn’t. While he acknowledged that the...
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John Michael Cooper
Jun 25, 20213 min read
FLORENCE PRICE’S WASHERWOMAN SUITE, ARRANGED FOR STRING QUARTET
YESTERDAY I LEARNED that Elaine Fine, whose arrangement of the now-quite-popular Adoration for violin or viola with piano remains the...
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John Michael Cooper
Jun 17, 20213 min read
A FLORENCE PRICE PREMIERE, MARGARET BONDS, AND A SELF-CORRECTION
This post is a short one, but I hope you’ll find it interesting. In an earlier post I remarked that Florence Price had submitted all four...
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