When one speaks of American violin concertos, composers' names such as Erich Wolfgang Korngold or Samuel Barber come up, perhaps one still remembers George Rochberg's Violin Concerto (first performed by Isaak Stern!) or Leonhard Bernstein's Serenade after Plato's Symposium. There are still few who would mention the first African-American composer Florence Price. She once introduced herself to the conductor and music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra as follows: "My dear Dr. Koussevitzky, To begin with I have two handicaps-those of sex and race. I am a woman; and I have some Negro blood in my veins." But Koussevitzky ignored her as a composer, as many still did. Both as a woman and as an African-American, she had every difficulty establishing herself as an orchestral composer in the USA of the first half of the 20th century. She had moved north to Chicago from her native Arkansas because of racial discrimination, then freed herself from a spouse who had become violent, and then consciously became involved in various organisations both for black musicians and for women musicians in general.

Florence Price studied piano, organ and composition and was enthusiastic about Antonin Dovrak's idea of carrying on a tradition of American symphonies that the latter had begun with his Symphony from the New World and which was to draw on the diverse American folk music. Only, according to Florence Price, the tradition of Black Folk Music should not be overlooked. Besides many songs, spirituals and compositions for children, she specifically composed orchestral music, namely symphonies, concertos for piano or violin. Her career was multifaceted; in addition to composer, she was a soloist, administrator and mother of two daughters. In 1933, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed her first symphony in E minor under the German-born conductor Frederick Stock. It was the first time a well-known American orchestra performed an orchestral work by an African-American woman. It cannot be said that Florence Price remained unknown in her own time, but her orchestral works were rarely played and her work was not further cultivated after her death in 1953. In 2009, for example, the buyers of a house in great need of renovation, where Florence Price used to spend her summers, discovered piles of her sheet music and writings. Only recently have her Violin Concertos No 1 and 2 been reissued and recorded on CD. Some recent performances, especially of the 2nd Violin Concerto, are also documented on Youtube. The fact that the internationally renowned conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin has recorded both Symphonies No 1 and 3 on the Deutsche Grammophon label in 2021 indicates a growing interest in their music.

The reason for this is not yet clear. To some, her music, which takes its cue from late Romanticism, can seem like film music; others discover a special creative energy of their own in this music, which brought elements of African-American music (spirituals and Java music) into American orchestral music in an invigorating way.

Thus, in Violin Concerto No 2, we can hear spiritual-like melodies played by a classical brass quartet of the orchestra, as well as Juba rhythms (Juba, also Giuba, was originally a "plantation dance, conceived and developed in the 19th century by West African slaves who were not allowed to use drums during their gatherings under threat of punishment. Instead, they used the body as a rhythm instrument and means of communication on the plantations. This included stomping, clapping and slapping or tapping their arms, legs, chests and cheeks to create various complex rhythms." Wikipedia)

Florence Price's Violin Concerto No 2 is in one movement and lasts only about 16 minutes. It is more like a rhapsody than a concerto movement composed in sonata form. Several themes take turns, repeat themselves, develop in the interplay of orchestra and violin and change depending on the orchestration context. One can discover a structure that flows over into itself from section to section: Opening theme - Juba theme - Spiritual theme - cadenza - opening theme - Jubla - Spiritual - reprise opening theme - Jubla - Spiritual - Jubla again in full orchestra, virtuosic, cadenza-like violin passages - fading of the Spiritual wind choir - short coda.
 

Listen here!

Listening companion: