Obscure Music Mondays

Robert Nathaniel Dett  (Oct. 11, 1882 - Oct. 2, 1943) was a composer, pianist, organist, and professor of music. Born in Ontario, Canada, he showed interest in music at a young age, and began piano lessons at five years old. The family moved to New York around the time Dett was ten years old, and a few years later he was playing piano for his church. He would later on study at the Oliver Willis Halstead Conservatory of Music, and continued studying piano at the Lockport Conservatory, before eventually attend the Curtis Institute of Music. At Curtis, Dett was introduced to the idea of using spirituals in classical music, like in the music of Antonin Dvorak. The music Dett heard reminded him of spirituals he'd learned from his grandmother, and he'd later on integrate folksongs and spirituals in to his music.   Continue reading →

Thomas "Blind Tom" Wiggins (May 25, 1849 - June 14, 1908) was an African-American musical prodigy on the piano. Born on a plantation in Georgia, he was sold, along with his parents, in to slavery. Because he was blind, his owner, James Bethune, originally wanted to kill him, as he couldn't do much of the work he demanded slaves do, but eventually decided to let him play and explore the plantation he was on.  Continue reading →

Samuel Colderidge-Taylor (Aug. 15, 1875 - Sept. 1, 1912) was born in London, England, to Alice Hare Martin, an English woman, and Dr. Daniel Peter Hughes Taylor, from Sierre Leone. They were not married, and Daniel Taylor returned to Africa before 1875, not even knowing he had a son. Martin named her son after the poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and was raised in Croydon, Surrey by his mother, and her father. Coleridge-Taylor studied violin at the Royal College of Music, and was later on appointed a professor at the Crystal Palace School of Music, and conducted the orchestra at the Croyden Conservatory.  Coleridge-Taylor found success at the Three Choirs Festival in Gloucester and Worcester; he was recommended by Edward Elgar, who heard rave reviews about Coleridge-Taylor from noted music critic and editor August Jaeger. He had much success during his time, and his interest in African-American culture brought him to the States on several occasions where his success continued. He made such an impression that he was invited to the White House by Theodore Roosevelt.  Continue reading →

František Černý (Jan. 23, 1861 - Sept. 3, 1940) was a Czech double bassist, composer, and teacher. Little is known about him, apart from his work as a double bassist.  Continue reading →

Benjamin James Dale (July 17, 1885 - July 30, 1943)  was a British composer and academic. The youngest of seven children, Dale's parents were supportive of his interest in music; his father was an amateur musician who played organ, and wrote hymns.  Continue reading →

Ladislas de Rohozinski (1886 - Sept. 4, 1938) was a French composer, music critic, and conductor born in Saint Petersburg, of Polish descent.  Continue reading →

Charles Wakefield Cadman (Dec. 24, 1881 - Dec. 30, 1946) was an American composer, pianist, and music critic trained entirely in America.  Continue reading →

Zdeněk Fibich (Dec. 21, 1850 - Oct. 15, 1900) was a Czech composer and pianist. Having a Czech father and German Viennese mother, Fibich grew up bilingual. Because of his father's work (a forestry official), he spent a lot of time moving around and living on various wooded estates, and the woods would become a source of inspiration for some of his compositions.  Continue reading →

Selim Gustav Adolf Palmgren (Feb. 16, 1878 - Dec. 13, 1951) was a Finnish composer, conductor, and pianist. He studied at the Helsinki Conservatory in Helsinki from 1895 to 1899, then continued his piano studies in Berlin. He conducted several orchestras and music societies in Finland, and had successful performances as a pianist in Finland and Scandanavia. In 1921 he moved to the United States to teach at the Eastman School of Music, and from 1936 - 1951, he was Professor of Harmony and Composition at the Sibelius Academy.  Continue reading →

Marion Bauer (Aug. 15, 1882 - Aug. 9, 1955) was an American composer, music critic, teacher, and writer. Born in Walla Walla, Washington, she was the youngest of seven children. Her father noticed her musical inclinations and she began studying piano  with her elder sister Emilie, who was 17 years older than her.  Continue reading →