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This talented musician constantly felt the burden of her parent’s legacy. Being the child of the renowned Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, one of the prominent English composers of the turn of the 20th century, her reputation was shrouded in the long shadows of the past.

A World Premiere

Earlier this year, I contemplated these memories as I prepared to produce the inaugural album of the composer’s piano concerto from 1936. Boasting impassioned harmonies, heartfelt tunes, and confident beats, this piece will offer audiences valuable perspective into how she – a composer during war originating from the early 1900s – conceived of her reality as a female composer of color.

Legacy and Reality

However about the past. It requires time to adjust, to see shapes as they really are, to distinguish truth from misrepresentation, and I was reluctant to address Avril’s past for a while.

I deeply hoped her to be her father’s daughter. To some extent, this was true. The pastoral English palettes of Samuel’s influence can be observed in several pieces, including From the Hills (1934) and Sussex Landscape (1940). However, one need only examine the headings of her father’s compositions to see how he viewed himself as not just a flag bearer of UK romantic tradition but a representative of the African diaspora.

At this point parent and child began to differ.

American society judged Samuel by the excellence of his music as opposed to the his racial background.

Parental Heritage

During his studies at the Royal College of Music, her father – the offspring of a African father and a British mother – started to lean into his heritage. When the African American poet Paul Laurence Dunbar visited the UK in the late 19th century, the young musician eagerly sought him out. He adapted Dunbar’s African Romances into music and the following year adapted his verses for a musical work, Dream Lovers. Subsequently arrived the choral work that established his reputation: Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast.

Based on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s The Song of Hiawatha, this composition was an international hit, particularly among Black Americans who felt indirect honor as American society evaluated the composer by the brilliance of his art as opposed to the his race.

Principles and Actions

Fame failed to diminish his beliefs. During that period, he participated in the First Pan African Conference in the UK where he made the acquaintance of the Black American thinker this influential figure and witnessed a variety of discussions, such as the oppression of the Black community there. He was a campaigner to his final days. He sustained relationships with pioneers of civil rights including Du Bois and the educator Washington, spoke publicly on racial equality, and even talked about matters of race with the US President during an invitation to the US capital in 1904. As for his music, reminisced Du Bois, “he wrote his name so prominently as a composer that it will long be remembered.” He passed away in 1912, aged 37. But what would Samuel have thought of his daughter’s decision to be in South Africa in the that decade?

Controversy and Apartheid

“Offspring of Renowned Musician shows support to S African Bias,” declared a title in the community journal Jet magazine. Apartheid “seems to me the right policy”, Avril told Jet. Upon further questioning, she qualified her remarks: she didn’t agree with apartheid “fundamentally” and it “ought to be permitted to resolve itself, directed by well-meaning people of all races”. Had Avril been more aligned to her father’s politics, or from the US under segregation, she may have reconsidered about apartheid. However, existence had shielded her.

Heritage and Innocence

“I possess a English document,” she said, “and the government agents never asked me about my race.” So, with her “light” appearance (according to the magazine), she moved alongside white society, supported by their acclaim for her late father. She gave a talk about her parent’s compositions at the Cape Town university and conducted the national orchestra in that location, programming the heroic third movement of her concerto, named: “Dedicated to my Father.” Even though a confident pianist herself, she did not perform as the soloist in her piece. Instead, she consistently conducted as the maestro; and so the apartheid orchestra performed under her direction.

The composer aspired, as she stated, she “could introduce a transformation”. But by 1954, circumstances deteriorated. When government agents discovered her African heritage, she had to depart the land. Her British passport didn’t protect her, the UK representative urged her to go or risk imprisonment. She came home, deeply ashamed as the extent of her naivety was realized. “The lesson was a painful one,” she lamented. Adding to her embarrassment was the release in 1955 of her ill-fated Jet interview, a year after her unceremonious exit from that nation.

A Familiar Story

As I sat with these shadows, I perceived a familiar story. The narrative of identifying as British until it’s challenged – that brings to mind troops of color who served for the English in the second world war and survived only to be refused rightful benefits. Along with the Windrush era,