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The composer Avril Coleridge-Taylor constantly experienced the burden of her family heritage. Being the child of the renowned Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, a leading the best-known English composers of the turn of the 20th century, Avril’s name was shrouded in the long shadows of the past.

An Inaugural Recording

Not long ago, I sat with these legacies as I prepared to produce the world premiere recording of Avril’s piano concerto from 1936. Featuring intense musical themes, soulful lyricism, and bold rhythms, Avril’s work will grant new listeners valuable perspective into how this artist – a wartime composer born in 1903 – envisioned her existence as a artist with mixed heritage.

Past and Present

But here’s the thing about shadows. It can take a while to adapt, to perceive forms as they truly exist, to separate fact from distortion, and I had been afraid to face her history for a period.

I had so wanted the composer to be following in her father’s footsteps. To some extent, that held. The idyllic English tones of her father’s impact can be heard in several pieces, such as From the Hills (1934) and Sussex Landscape (1940). But you only have to look at the names of her family’s music to see how he heard himself as not just a champion of British Romantic style as well as a representative of the Black diaspora.

This was where father and daughter appeared to part ways.

American society assessed the composer by the brilliance of his art instead of the colour of his skin.

Family Background

While he was studying at the prestigious music college, her father – the child of a parent from Sierra Leone and a British mother – started to lean into his background. When the Black American writer this literary figure arrived in England in that era, the young musician eagerly sought him out. He composed the poet’s African Romances to music and the following year used the poet’s words for an opera, Dream Lovers. Subsequently arrived the choral work that made him famous: Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast.

Inspired by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s The Song of Hiawatha, this composition was an worldwide sensation, notably for African Americans who felt indirect honor as American society evaluated the composer by the brilliance of his art rather than the his race.

Principles and Actions

Fame failed to diminish his activism. At the turn of the century, he was present at the First Pan African Conference in England where he met the African American intellectual WEB Du Bois and witnessed a series of speeches, including on the oppression of Black South Africans. He was a campaigner until the end. He kept connections with trailblazers for equality like this intellectual and Booker T Washington, delivered his own speeches on equality for all, and even engaged in dialogue on issues of racism with the US President while visiting to the White House in 1904. Regarding his compositions, reminisced Du Bois, “he made his mark so prominently as a creative artist that it cannot soon be forgotten.” He succumbed in that year, in his thirties. But what would the composer have reacted to his offspring’s move to travel to this country in the mid-20th century?

Issues and Stance

“Child of Celebrated Artist expresses approval to apartheid system,” ran a headline in the African American magazine Jet magazine. The system “struck me as the right policy”, Avril told Jet. When pushed to clarify, she revised her statement: she didn’t agree with apartheid “as a concept” and it “should be allowed to work itself out, overseen by benevolent South Africans of diverse ethnicities”. Had Avril been more attuned to her father’s politics, or born in the US under segregation, she could have hesitated about this system. However, existence had protected her.

Background and Inexperience

“I possess a UK passport,” she stated, “and the government agents did not inquire me about my background.” Thus, with her “fair” skin (as Jet put it), she traveled within European circles, lifted by their admiration for her renowned family member. She presented about her family’s work at the University of Cape Town and directed the broadcasting ensemble in that location, programming the inspiring part of her concerto, subtitled: “In remembrance of my Father.” While a accomplished player personally, she did not perform as the soloist in her concerto. On the contrary, she invariably directed as the conductor; and so the apartheid orchestra performed under her direction.

The composer aspired, as she stated, she “might bring a change”. Yet in the mid-1950s, things fell apart. After authorities became aware of her Black ancestry, she was forced to leave the nation. Her British passport offered no defense, the UK representative recommended her departure or be jailed. She returned to England, feeling great shame as the magnitude of her inexperience was realized. “The lesson was a painful one,” she expressed. Compounding her embarrassment was the printing that year of her controversial discussion, a year after her forced leaving from the country.

A Familiar Story

As I sat with these shadows, I sensed a familiar story. The account of holding UK citizenship until it’s revoked – one that calls to mind African-descended soldiers who served for the British throughout the World War II and made it through but were not given their earned rewards. And the Windrush generation,