top of page

Search


THREE IN D.C.
The Voice of Margaret Bonds Rises in Three Events in the U.S. Capital This Weekend The estimable Margaret Bonds’s (1913-72) musical...
John Michael Cooper
Mar 29, 20224 min read
46 views
0 comments


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....
John Michael Cooper
Mar 19, 20223 min read
461 views
0 comments


JUDGEMENT DAY:
A Gospel Song by Florence Price and Langston Hughes Gets a Belated First Recording Popular exclamations about the trove of Florence Price...
John Michael Cooper
Mar 11, 20224 min read
74 views
0 comments


THE CREDO SOUNDS AGAIN
W.E.B. Du Bois’s bold and brilliant civil-rights manifesto Credo was first published in 1904 and republished with revisions at the head...
John Michael Cooper
Feb 18, 20224 min read
45 views
0 comments


SINCE 1973
On Tuesday, February 15, 2022, at 7:30 p.m. CT, the internationally heralded GRAMMY-winning chorus Conspirare, conducted by...
John Michael Cooper
Feb 12, 20223 min read
101 views
0 comments


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...
John Michael Cooper
Feb 4, 20224 min read
158 views
0 comments


MARGARET BONDS’S "TROUBLED WATER" IN HER ARRANGEMENT FOR CELLO AND PIANO
Troubled Water is arguably Margaret Bonds’s best-known instrumental composition. Published by itself by Sam Fox Publishing (New York) in...
John Michael Cooper
Jan 27, 20222 min read
340 views
0 comments


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...
John Michael Cooper
Jan 15, 20222 min read
90 views
0 comments


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...
John Michael Cooper
Jan 13, 20225 min read
184 views
0 comments


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...
John Michael Cooper
Jan 2, 20222 min read
177 views
0 comments


A MOST AUGUST OCCASION
And a Most August Album and Edition, on the Bicentennial of Pauline Viardot-García Few musical dynasties compare to the one that included...
John Michael Cooper
Dec 27, 20217 min read
184 views
0 comments


TWO POSTHUMOUS REVIVALS OF MARGARET BONDS AND LANGSTON HUGHES: AFRICAN DANCE (Danse africaine)
Performances by Greg Watkins and Members of the CAAPA Chorale, November 14, 2021; and Anton Nel and Members of Conspirare, February 15,...
John Michael Cooper
Dec 13, 20212 min read
129 views
0 comments


ARE WOMEN PEOPLE?
An Important New Album from Composer Lori Laitman “Settles the Question” I’m not a reviewer – I’m just a musicologist who’s deeply,...
John Michael Cooper
Dec 8, 20216 min read
189 views
0 comments


A(NOTHER) MARGARET BONDS PREMIERE:
African Dance, on a Text by Langston Hughes, Gets Its Posthumous Premiere This Weekend On Sunday, November 14, 2021, Greg Watkins and the...
John Michael Cooper
Nov 8, 20214 min read
52 views
0 comments


THE PROGRAM OF THE MONTGOMERY VARIATIONS
The Minnesota Orchestra Has Recorded an Orchestral Masterpiece by Margaret Bonds [Update 11/13/21: The Minnesota Orchestra's recording is...
John Michael Cooper
Oct 15, 20212 min read
236 views
0 comments


MARGARET BONDS’S SENIOR RECITAL (1933)
With a Playlist Before 1934, Margaret Bonds publicly programmed only all-White recitals. After 1934 she never did that again. Why the...
John Michael Cooper
Sep 20, 20214 min read
139 views
0 comments


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...
John Michael Cooper
Aug 28, 20214 min read
429 views
0 comments

“YOU GIVE ME A LIFT”
A Song Lyric by Margaret Bonds Margaret Bonds traveled nearly constantly in her adult life. Even though she maintained a single address...
John Michael Cooper
Aug 5, 20212 min read
30 views
0 comments


LIVING VICARIOUSLY THROUGH POEMS:
MARGARET BONDS, EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY, AND LANGSTON HUGHES* * (WITH A CAMEO BY DEBUSSY AND PIERRE LOUŸS) The long, close, and...
John Michael Cooper
Jul 10, 20213 min read
59 views
0 comments


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...
John Michael Cooper
Jun 25, 20213 min read
129 views
0 comments

John Michael Cooper
Mar 1710 min read
0


John Michael Cooper
Mar 411 min read
1


John Michael Cooper
Jan 174 min read
0


John Michael Cooper
Nov 2, 20245 min read
0

bottom of page