Florence Price
1887 - 1953
American
Biography
The discovery of dozens of scores in an Illinois attic in 2009 led to renewed interest in the music of Florence Price, performances and recordings, and critical acclaim. Her music combines a rich and romantic symphonic idiom with the melodic intimacy and emotional intensity of African-American spirituals. As Alex Ross wrote in The New Yorker, her music "deserves to be widely heard."
In 1932 her Sonata in E Minor for piano won First Prize in the Wanamaker music contest, with overall honors awarded to her first symphony. Frederick Stock, music director of the Chicago Symphony, became a supporter of her music and programmed the work. Price became the first African-American woman to have a work performed by a major U.S. orchestra when the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed it in 1933. Though she composed hundreds of pieces, her catalogue did not enter the twentieth-century mainstream canon, and many of her works, including two violin concertos, could have vanished if not uncovered during the renovation of her abandoned home.
Born in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1887, Price received early training on the piano from her mother, a music teacher. She went on to attend the New England Conservatory, one of few higher musical institutions accepting African-American students. There, she studied composition and counterpoint with George Chadwick and Frederick Converse, and graduated in 1906 with both an artistic diploma in organ and a teaching certificate. After years teaching music privately and serving as the head of the music department at Clark Atlanta University in Atlanta, Georgia, Price returned to Little Rock, then moved to Chicago, where she advanced her musical studies under Arthur Olaf Andersen, Carl Busch, Wesley LaViolette, and Leo Sowerby.
Price artist-playlist on Spotify
In 1932 her Sonata in E Minor for piano won First Prize in the Wanamaker music contest, with overall honors awarded to her first symphony. Frederick Stock, music director of the Chicago Symphony, became a supporter of her music and programmed the work. Price became the first African-American woman to have a work performed by a major U.S. orchestra when the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed it in 1933. Though she composed hundreds of pieces, her catalogue did not enter the twentieth-century mainstream canon, and many of her works, including two violin concertos, could have vanished if not uncovered during the renovation of her abandoned home.
Born in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1887, Price received early training on the piano from her mother, a music teacher. She went on to attend the New England Conservatory, one of few higher musical institutions accepting African-American students. There, she studied composition and counterpoint with George Chadwick and Frederick Converse, and graduated in 1906 with both an artistic diploma in organ and a teaching certificate. After years teaching music privately and serving as the head of the music department at Clark Atlanta University in Atlanta, Georgia, Price returned to Little Rock, then moved to Chicago, where she advanced her musical studies under Arthur Olaf Andersen, Carl Busch, Wesley LaViolette, and Leo Sowerby.
Price artist-playlist on Spotify
News
Performances
28th September 2020
- PERFORMERS
- Chineke! Orchestra
- CONDUCTOR
- Roderick Cox
- LOCATION
- Royal Festival Hall, London, United Kingdom
4th October 2020
- PERFORMERS
- Boston Conservatory Orchestra
- CONDUCTOR
- Bruce Hangen
- LOCATION
- Jordan Hall, Boston, MA
10th October 2020
- PERFORMERS
- Idaho Falls Symphony
- CONDUCTOR
- Thomas Heuser
- LOCATION
- Civic Center for the Performing Arts, Idaho Falls, ID
25th October 2020
- SOLOISTS
- Performing Selections
- PERFORMERS
- National Symphony Orchestra
- CONDUCTOR
- Michelle Merrill
- LOCATION
- Howard University / Washington, DC / United States
25th October 2020
- PERFORMERS
- New Texas Symphony Orchestra
- CONDUCTOR
- Dr. Kathryn Brown
- LOCATION
- Moody Performance Hall, Dallas, TX, United States
Features
- American Tone Poems
- As the season gets underway and plans for future seasons take shape, explore this selection of tone poems by American composers from the catalogues of Wise Music Group.
- Original Manuscripts of Florence Price Discovered and Published by G. Schirmer
- Wise Music Group announces the discovery of three previously unpublished works of composer Florence Price: Songs of the Oak, Colonial Dance, and the original version of Price's Piano Concerto in One Movement, all penned in her own hand.