We are pleased to share a special Musings, a preview of the program notes for our upcoming concert. Enjoy these notes, and buy tickets for the concert to hear these pieces played just for you!
Symphony No. 1, “Afro-American”
William Grant Still
William Grant Still (1895–1978) was born in Mississippi just a few years before George Gershwin and raised in Arkansas. It comes as no surprise that he occupies a singular place in American music history since he was fortunate enough to grow up in a family that valued literature, education, and music as necessary parts of life. His mother, Carrie Lena Fambro, was a teacher and became a widow to a local bandleader named William Grant Still Sr.
After William Grant Still Sr.’s death in 1904 when little William was barely three months old, his stepfather, Charles Shepperson, introduced him to opera recordings and encouraged his musical curiosity. That early exposure gave the young Still a sense of musical possibility far beyond what was typically available to a young Black musician in the early twentieth century.
Still studied at Wilberforce University and later at the Oberlin Conservatory, where his talent for orchestration quickly became apparent. This does not mean that he limited himself to symphonic writing and studies. He also worked as an arranger for W. C. Handy, wrote for theater orchestras (where it is possible George Gershwin may have heard him!), contributed to early radio ensembles, and became part of what became known as the Harlem Renaissance. He absorbed blues, spirituals, and popular idioms as authentic expressions of Black life and felt that vernacular to be worthy of the same symphonic treatment as any European tradition.
By the early 1930s, Still was determined to bring those idioms into the concert hall much as Gershwin was doing around the same time. The result was the “Afro‑American” Symphony, completed in 1930 and premiered in 1931. It was the first symphony by a Black composer performed by a major American orchestra, opening the door to contemporaries such as Florence B. Price and William Dawson.
Still described the work as an attempt to portray “the sons of the soil,” a phrase that gives symphonic voice to the emotional landscape of Black American experience. Blues progressions, melodic inflections drawn from spirituals, and rhythmic gestures rooted in dance traditions are clearly present as pillars of the symphony’s structural foundation. The piece moves through an emotional gamut—moods of longing, humor, reflection, uplift—all shaped by the musical language Still believed was a portrayal of the Black identity of the day.
The “Afro‑American” Symphony is notable in its balance of ambition and familiarity. He took the symphonic form historically associated with European lineage and unashamedly infused it with materials that had grown out of American soil. In doing so, he offered a vision of American music that was creatively sincere.
The “Afro‑American” Symphony remains an important symphonic statement in our musical history for it is a work that insists that America’s story cannot be told without the voices that shaped it.
The rest of the Musings for “American Journey” are posted on the Bloomington Symphony website. Join us in person on Sunday, October 11 at 2 p.m. at St. Michael’s Lutheran Church in Bloomington. This concert includes William Schuman’s “Chester” from New England Triptych, and George Gershwin’s An American in Paris. Tickets will be available at the door, but we encourage you to buy in advance to save money and reduce your wait!