Dvořák's prophecy : and the vexed fate of Black classical music

Resource Information

The work Dvořák's prophecy : and the vexed fate of Black classical music represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in Portland Public Library. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

Dvořák's prophecy : and the vexed fate of Black classical music

Title remainder

and the vexed fate of Black classical music

Statement of responsibility

Joseph Horowitz ; [foreword by George Shirley]

Creator

• Horowitz, Joseph, 1948-

Contributor

• Shirley, George

Author

• Horowitz, Joseph, 1948-

Subject

• African Americans -- Music
• African Americans -- Music | History and criticism
• Compositeurs noirs américains -- Histoire et critique
• Criticism, interpretation, etc
• Dvořák, Antonín, 1841-1904
• Dvořák, Antonín, 1841-1904
• Informational works
• Music
• Music -- African American influences
• Music -- United States -- African American influences
• Music -- United States -- History and criticism
• Music and race
• Music and race -- United States
• Musiciens noirs américains -- Histoire et critique
• Musique -- États-Unis -- Histoire et critique
• Musique et race -- États-Unis
• United States
• African American composers -- History and criticism
• African American musicians -- History and criticism

Genre

• Informational works
• Criticism, interpretation, etc

Language

eng

Summary

A provocative interpretation of why classical music in America "stayed white"- how it got to be that way and what can be done about it. In 1893 the composer Antonín Dvořák prophesied a "great and noble school" of American classical music based on the "negro melodies" he had excitedly discovered since arriving in the United States a year before. But while BLack music would foster popular genres known the world over, it never gained a foothold in the concert hall. Black composers found few opportunities to have their works performed, and white composers mainly rejected Dvořák's lead. Joseph Horowitz ranges throughout American cultural history, from Frederick Douglass and Huckleberry Finn to George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess and the work of Ralph Ellison, searching for explanations. Challenging the standard narrative for American classical music fashioned by Aaron Copland and Leonard Berstein, he looks back to literary figures--Emerson, Melville, and Twain--to ponder how American music can connect with a "usable past." The result is a new paradigm that makes room for Black composers, including Harry Burleigh, Nathaniel Dett, William Levi Dawson, and Florence Price, while giving increased prominence to Charles Ives and George Gershwin. Dvořák's Prophecy arrives in the midst of an important conversation about race in America--a conversation that is taking place in music schools and concert halls as well as capitals and boardroooms. As George Shirley writes in his foreword to the book, "We have been left unprepared for the current cultural moment. [Joseph Horowitz] explains how we got there [and] proposes a bigger world of American classical music than what we have known before. It is more diverse and more equitable. And it is more truthful." --

Assigning source

From dust jacket

Cataloging source

DLC

Index

index present

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

bibliography

Target audience

adult

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