~ 
Marian Anderson ~ Sings
10" vinyl LP front cover detail
detail photo by Styrous®
Today is the birthday of Marian Anderson, who was born on February 27, 1897, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She had a rich, vibrant contralto voice that could reach the far depths of any concert hall and Arturo Toscanini described as a voice "heard once in a hundred years."
Anderson was an instrumental force in the civil rights movement
that was to emerge 15 years later. One of the United States' most
successful classical singers at the time, she had been scheduled to
perform at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C, on Easter Sunday, April 9, in 1939, a celebrated venue operated by the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR).
However,
the DAR, under a "white performers-only" policy in effect at the time,
refused to allow Anderson, an African-American woman, to perform to an
integrated audience. Led by First Lady Eleanor Roosevel,
thousands of members of the DAR resigned in protest. The venue was
changed and Anderson gave a free open-air concert on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.
The
moment brought even greater awareness to the issues of racial injustice
during that time period as more than 75,000 people attended as well as a
national radio audience of millions; FAR more then would have been able
to attend at the hall. It always amazes me that small minds tend to do
stupid things that only amplify what they want to suppress.
Anderson was photographed at the end of the day standing in front of the sculpture of Abraham Lincoln at the Lincoln Memorial.
Marian Anderson - Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939
photo:
The event inspired a mural by Mitchell Jamieson in 1943, entitled, An Incident in Contemporary American Life, which was installed at the United States Department of the Interior Building.
Mitchell Jamieson - 1943
An Incident in Contemporary American Life
Two months later, in conjunction with the 30th NAACP conference in Richmond, Virginia, Eleanor Roosevelt gave a speech on national radio (NBC and CBS) and presented Anderson with the 1939 Spingarn Medal for distinguished achievement. In 2001, a documentary film of the event was chosen for the National Film Registry, and NBC radio coverage of the event was selected for the National Recording Registry.
Eleanor Roosevelt & Marian Anderson - 1939
photo: Prints and Photographs Division,
On January 6, 1943, Anderson greeted members of the audience at the ceremony held in
the auditorium of the United States Department of the Interior at the dedication
of the mural painting commemorating the free public concert given by her on
the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on Easter Sunday, 1939.
Marian Anderson - January 6, 1943
photographer unknown
Anderson attended Stanton Grammar School, graduating in 1912. Her family
could not pay for music lessons or high school. Still, she
continued to perform wherever she could and learn from anyone who was
willing to teach her. Throughout her teenage years, she remained active
in her church's musical activities, now heavily involved in the adult
choir. She became a member of the Baptists' Young People's Union and the
Camp Fire Girls, which provided her with some limited musical opportunities.
Eventually, the People's Chorus of Philadelphia and the pastor of her
church, Reverend Wesley Parks, along with other leaders of the black
community, raised the money she needed to get singing lessons with Mary
Saunders Patterson and to attend South Philadelphia High School, from which she graduated in 1921.
After high school, she applied to an all-white music school, the Philadelphia Music Academy
(now University of the Arts), but was turned away because she was
black. The woman working the admissions counter replied, "We don't take
colored" when she tried to apply. Anderson pursued studies privately in
her native city through the continued support of the Philadelphia black
community.
In 1925, Anderson got her first big break at a singing competition sponsored by the New York Philharmonic.
As the winner, she got to perform in concert with the orchestra on
August 26, 1925, a performance that scored immediate success with both
the audience and music critics. Anderson continued her studies with Frank La Forge in New York. During this time, Arthur Judson
became her manager. They met through the New York Philharmonic. Over
the next several years, she made a number of concert appearances in the
United States, but racial prejudice prevented her career from gaining
momentum. Her first performance at Carnegie Hall was in 1928.
Marian Anderson recital
Anderson went to Europe, where she spent a number of months studying with Sara Charles-Cahier, before launching a highly successful European singing tour. In the summer of 1930, she went to Scandinavia, where she met the Finnish pianist Kosti Vehanen, who became her regular accompanist and her vocal coach for many years. She met Jean Sibelius through Vehanen after he had heard her in a concert in Helsinki. The two struck up an immediate friendship, which blossomed into a
professional partnership, and for many years Sibelius altered and
composed songs for Anderson. He created a new arrangement of the song Solitude and dedicated it to Anderson in 1939 (link below). Originally The Jewish Girl's Song from his 1906 incidental music to Belshazzar's Feast, it later became the "Solitude" section of the orchestral suite derived from the incidental music.
In 1933, Anderson made her European debut in a concert at Wigmore Hall
in London, where she was received enthusiastically. In the first years
of the 1930s, she toured Europe, where she did not encounter the
prejudices she had experienced in America.
Accompanied by Vehanen, she continued to tour throughout Europe
during the mid-1930s. Before going back to Scandinavia, where fans had
"Marian fever", she performed in Russia and the major cities of Eastern
Europe. She quickly became a favorite of many conductors and composers
of major European orchestras. During a 1935 tour in Salzburg, the
conductor Arturo Toscanini told her she had a voice "heard once in a hundred years."
In 1934, impresario Sol Hurok became her manager, and he persuaded her to come back and
perform in America. On December 30, 1935, Anderson made her second recital appearance at The Town Hall, New York City (link below), which received highly favorable reviews from music critics.
She spent the next four years touring throughout the United States and
Europe. She was offered opera roles by several European houses, but due
to her lack of acting experience, Anderson declined all of them. She
did, however, record a number of arias in the studio, which became
bestsellers.
Marian Anderson recital - 1943
Anderson's accomplishments as a singer did not make her immune to the Jim Crow laws
in the 1930s. Although she gave approximately seventy recitals a year
in the United States, Anderson was still turned away by some American
hotels and restaurants. Because of this discrimination, Albert Einstein,
a champion of racial tolerance, hosted Anderson on many occasions, the
first being in 1937 when she was denied a hotel room before performing
at Princeton University. She last stayed with him months before he died in 1955.
On June 15, 1953, Anderson headlined The Ford 50th Anniversary Show (link below), which was broadcast live from New York City on both NBC and CBS. Midway through the program, she sang He's Got the Whole World in His Hands. She returned to close the program with her rendition of the Battle Hymn of the Republic. The program attracted an audience of 60 million viewers. Forty years after the broadcast, television critic Tom Shales recalled the broadcast as both "a landmark in television" and "a milestone in the cultural life of the '50s"
photo: Carnegie Hall Archives
On January 7, 1955, Anderson became the first African-American to sing with the Metropolitan Opera in New York. At the invitation of director Rudolf Bing, she sang the part of Ulrica in Un ballo in maschera by Giuseppe Verdi (opposite Zinka Milanov as Amelia).
Anderson later said about the evening, "The curtain rose on the second
scene and I was there on stage, mixing the witch's brew. I trembled, and
when the audience applauded and applauded before I could sing a note, I
felt myself tightening into a knot." Although she never appeared with
the company again, Anderson was named a permanent member of the
Metropolitan Opera company. The following year, her autobiography, My Lord, What a Morning, was published, and became a bestseller.
In 1957, she sang for the inauguration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, and toured India and the Far East as a goodwill ambassador through the U.S. State Department and the American National Theater and Academy. On January 20, 1961, she sang for the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy, and in 1962 she performed for President Kennedy and other dignitaries in the East Room of the White House.
On Wednesday, August 28, 1963, she sang He's Got the Whole World In His Hands at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
Marian Anderson - August 28, 1963
photographer unknown
That same year, she received one of the newly reinstituted Presidential Medal of Freedom,
which is awarded for "especially meritorious contributions to the
security or national interest of the United States, World Peace or
cultural or other significant public or private endeavors."
Her achievements were recognized with many honors, including the University of Pennsylvania Glee Club Award of Merit in 1973; the United Nations Peace Prize, the New York City Handel Medallion, and the Congressional Gold Medal, all in 1977; Kennedy Center Honors in 1978; the George Peabody Medal in 1981; the National Medal of Arts in 1986; and a Grammy Award for Lifetime Achievement in 1991. A half-ounce gold commemorative medal was embossed with her portrait by the United States Treasury Department
in 1980. Four years later, she was the first person to be honored with
the Eleanor Roosevelt Human Rights Award of the City of New York. She has been awarded 24 honorary doctoral degrees, from Howard University, Temple University, Smith College and many others.
Although Anderson retired from singing in 1965, she continued to appear publicly. She often narrated the Lincoln Portrait by Aaron Copland, with her nephew James DePriest conducting.
photographer unknown
Marian Anderson died at the home of her nephew, conductor James DePreist, in Portland, Oregon, on April 8, 1993, of congestive heart failure; she was 96 years old.
Tracklist:
Side 1:
Side 1:
A1 - Marian Anderson - Oh Mio Fernando, Part 1
A2 - Marian Anderson - Oh Love From Thy Powers
A4 - Marian Anderson - Air Des Adieux
A2 - Marian Anderson - Oh Love From Thy Powers
A4 - Marian Anderson - Air Des Adieux
Side 2:
B1 - Marian Anderson - Heav'n Heav'n
B2 - Thelma Carpenter & The Harmonaires (12) - Joshua Fit De Battle Of Jerico
B3 - Thelma Carpenter & The Harmonaires (12) - Swing Low Sweet Chariot
B4 - Thelma Carpenter & The Harmonaires (12 - Deep River
Notes:
Track A1: From "La Favorita" (Donizetti) Parts 1& 2
Track A2: From Sampson and Delilah (Saint-Saens)
Track A4: From Jeanne D'Arc (Carafa)
Disc Labels: Made in U.S.A.
Back Cover: A Catalogue of Varsity Records, "Vinyl Filled- Hard Multi-Colored Jackets- Full Fidelity Recordings"
Printed in U.S.A.
Barcode and Other Identifiers
Matrix / Runout (Side 1, Stamped (G On Its Back)): G LP61A
Matrix / Runout (Side 2, Stamped (F On Its Back)): F LP61B
Matrix / Runout (Both Sides, Hand Etched ): V
Marian Anderson / Thelma Carpenter, The Harmonaires (12) – Marian Anderson Sings
Label: Varsity – 6986
Format: Vinyl, LP, 10", Album
Country: US
Released: Genre:
Classical, Folk, World, & Country
Style: Opera, Religious
Label: Varsity – 6986
Format: Vinyl, LP, 10", Album
Country: US
Released: Genre:
Classical, Folk, World, & Country
Style: Opera, Religious
Viewfinder links:
Net links:
Connecticut History ~ Marian Anderson’s Role in the Civil Rights Movement
National Geographic ~ Marian Anderson Performs on the National Mall
The New Yorker ~ When Marian Anderson Defied the Nazis
Philadelphia Tribune ~ 'Once in a Hundred Years' documentary
Smithsonian ~ Newly Digitized Diaries and Letters of Marian Anderson
YouTube links:
Marian Anderson Performs at the Lincoln Memorial (complete) (29 mins, 43 secs.)
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