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104:. Two years later, Charlotte (who was also known as Carlotta) gave birth to Freeman's son Valdo, and the same year, the Cleveland Orchestra gave readings of excerpts from Freeman's operas. For the next decade, the new family lived in Cleveland, Chicago, and Xenia, Ohio, where Freeman was director of the music program at
50:
Harry
Lawrence Freeman was born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1869, to parents Lemuel Freeman and Agnes Silms-Freeman. Freeman learned to play the piano and was an assistant church organist by the age of 10. At the age of 18, he was inspired to begin composing his own music after attending a performance of
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Although many of his works were successful during his lifetime, they are not played today. He achieved many firsts for a black
American in the field of classical and popular music. While Elise Kirk cites several operas composed by African-Americans earlier in the nineteenth century, it appears that
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Freeman died of a heart ailment at his home at 214 West 127th Street, New York City on March 24, 1954. His wife
Carlotta died only three months later. The last couple of decades of his life were marked with frustration as he struggled to get any performances of his work. Almost all of his music was
120:
neighborhood of New York City. In 1912, ragtime composer Scott Joplin, who was then living in New York, asked
Freeman's help in revising his three-act opera, "Treemonisha," production of which had stalled the previous year. The extent of Freeman's help is unknown. In 1920, he opened the Salem
184:, which Elise Kirk identifies as one of the earliest operas composed by an American to be broadcast on radio. It was the first opera by an African-American to be presented on Broadway. Its score combines themes from spirituals, Southern melodies, jazz, and traditional Italian opera.
144:'s Musical Comedy Company, of which Carlotta Freeman was the prima donna; the Cole-Johnson African-American musical theater company, and the John Larkins Musical Comedy Company. He was musical director and wrote additional music for the Hogan's Musical Comedy Company production
38:, 1891) that was successfully produced. Freeman founded the Freeman School of Music and the Freeman School of Grand Opera, as well as several short-lived opera companies which gave first performances of his own compositions. During his life, he was known as "the black
227:
unpublished at the time of his death, and no recordings of his work have ever been released commercially. Twenty-one of his operas, as well as many of his other works, survive in
Freeman's own manuscripts, and are kept in a collection of his papers at
168:(1928) is perhaps Freeman's best known work. It deals with the cult of that name in Louisiana. Although Freeman finished composing the opera in 1914, it was not premiered until fourteen years later. On September 10, 1928, at Palm Garden at 310 West
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77:, premiered at the same theater on August 16, 1893. It was also produced by the Freeman Opera Company, and concerned an Egyptian nobleman put to death for accepting the religion of Jehovah. The Freeman Opera Company went on to produce
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in 1891. Freeman founded and played important roles in the direction of several
African-American opera companies and other arts organizations, including the Pekin Stock Company in Chicago, which was one of the first
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in Harlem, later renamed
Freeman School of Music. Also in 1920, he founded the Negro Grand Opera Company, which produced several productions of his own works. Freeman's wife
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is also listed by John
Warthen Struble as "produced in Denver, first known opera by an African-American composer." Although this is clearly incorrect given the staging of
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in
Chicago in October 1893 and in Cleveland in 1894. This was the first opera in the United States to be produced by an all-Black production company.
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Freeman published quite a few popular songs, including arrangements of spirituals, and wrote some music for the concert hall, including:
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484:" theaters in the United States to be owned and run by African-Americans. Freeman was a close friend of famous Ragtime musician
100:, which was founded in 1918). In 1898, Freeman married Charlotte Loise Thomas, a woman from Charleston, South Carolina who sang
333:, opera in three acts, libretto by the composer (November 12, 1923, Negro Grand Opera Company, Inc., Lafayette Theater, Harlem)
152:, which premiered August 12, 1907 at the Harlem Music Hall. He was guest conductor and composer/music director of the pageant
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which filled over 2,000 pages of score, were never performed. In addition to composing the music, Freeman wrote his own
263:, opera in two acts, libretto by the composer (August 16, 1893, Freeman Grand Opera Company, Deutsches Theater, Denver)
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two years earlier, Freeman was certainly a pioneering classical composer in the
African-American community.
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opera composer, conductor, impresario and teacher. He was the first African-American to write an opera (
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By the age of 22, Freeman had founded the Freeman Opera Company in Denver, Colorado. His first opera,
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At New York's Steinway Hall in 1930, Freeman accompanied at the piano a performance of excerpts from
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Bordman, Gerald, "American Musical Theatre: A Chronicle," 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, 1992.
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In 1894, Freeman returned to live in Cleveland, and began formal training in music theory under
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Journal of the American Musicological Society, vol. 72 Number 3, pp. 719–779 (2019).
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In addition to grand opera, Freeman wrote stage music and served as musical director for
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and was acquainted with many African-American musicians and artists associated with the
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Freeman composed at least twenty-three operas, Many, including a massive tetralogy
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Profiles of African American Stage Performers and Theatre People, 1816-1960
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on May 20, 1928, and on September 10, 1928 at the Palm Garden on Broadway)
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96:, conductor of the Cleveland Symphony (a different organization from the
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district, with an all-black cast. A May 20, 1928 concert performance of
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The History of American Classical Music: MacDowell Through Minimalism,
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645:"Harry Lawrence Freeman: Pioneering the African American Grand Opera"
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303:, musical comedy (August 12, 1907, Harlem Music Hall, New York City)
269:, opera in three acts, libretto by the composer (1898; unperformed)
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none of these ever were staged in their entirety before Freeman's
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by Bernard L. Peterson (Greenwood Publications Group, 2001) p. 94
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and musical theater companies in the early 1900s. These included
315:, opera in one act, libretto by the composer (1911; unperformed)
883:
Harry Lawrence Freeman Papers, Rare Book and Manuscript Library
279:) (scenes performed by the Cleveland Symphony in 1900)
401:(1941-1944). The titles of the individual operas are
629:accompanying the H. Lawrence Freeman papers at the
30:(October 9, 1869 – March 24, 1954) was an American
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375:, opera, based on H. Rider Haggard's novels (1934)
369:, opera, based on H. Rider Haggard's novels (1947)
671:"H. Lawrence Freeman and the Harlem Renaissance"
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359:. Libretto by the composer, after the play of
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180:was broadcast live on New York radio station
116:Around 1908, the Freeman family moved to the
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694:by John Warthen Struble, Facts On File 1995
669:Gutkin, David; Newland, Marti (Fall 2015).
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16:American composer and conductor (1869–1954)
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257:, opera (1891, Deutsches Theater, Denver)
906:"The Modernities of H. Lawrence Freeman"
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947:20th-century African-American musicians
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847:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.10187
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811:, University of Illinois Press, 2001.
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962:African-American classical composers
952:20th-century American male musicians
937:19th-century American male musicians
967:African-American conductors (music)
250:Freeman's works for stage include:
65:Early career: Freeman Opera Company
992:African-American opera librettists
191:in 1930 for achievement in music.
14:
1027:Classical musicians from Colorado
187:Freeman received the prestigious
112:Harlem: Negro Grand Opera Company
1012:American male conductors (music)
982:African-American opera composers
977:African-American music educators
957:20th-century classical composers
942:19th-century classical composers
795:American Opera and Its Composers
532:African-American musical theater
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1072:Wilberforce University faculty
643:Worley, Ben (September 2018).
393:, a four-opera cycle based on
247:for almost all of his operas.
1:
1052:American male opera composers
1032:Classical musicians from Ohio
887:Columbia University Libraries
631:Columbia University Libraries
1002:American classical composers
864:UK public library membership
1022:American Romantic composers
1007:American conductors (music)
828:"Freeman, (Harry) Lawrence"
793:Hipsher, Edward Ellsworth,
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997:American opera librettists
896:Internet Broadway Database
744:Kirk, Elise Kuhl (2001).
1057:Musicians from Cleveland
1017:American music educators
987:American opera composers
1037:Educators from Colorado
839:Oxford University Press
797:, Da Capo Press, 1978.
417:. All were unperformed.
381:, symphonic poem (1932)
189:Harmon Foundation Award
892:Harry Lawrence Freeman
510:Classical music portal
106:Wilberforce University
28:Harry Lawrence Freeman
24:
23:Harry Lawrence Freeman
1067:Neoromantic composers
1062:Musicians from Denver
678:American Music Review
463:Coleville Coon Cadets
129:and his son Valdo, a
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1047:American impresarios
426:The Loves of Pompeii
415:Umslopogaas and Nada
158:Chicago World's Fair
94:Johann Heinrich Beck
1042:Educators from Ohio
837:. Oxford, England:
363:(1931; unperformed)
339:, jazz opera (1927)
229:Columbia University
222:Death and obscurity
121:School of Music on
98:Cleveland Orchestra
834:Grove Music Online
807:Kirk, Elise Kuhl,
652:Journal of Singing
490:Harlem Renaissance
108:in 1902 and 1903.
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862:(subscription or
856:978-1-56159-263-0
757:978-0-252-02623-2
627:Biographical Note
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361:C. M. S. McLellan
154:O Sing a New Song
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486:Scott Joplin
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927:1954 deaths
922:1869 births
459:with chorus
170:52nd Street
32:neoromantic
916:Categories
538:References
482:legitimate
430:song cycle
261:The Martyr
208:Plantation
196:The Martyr
138:vaudeville
83:The Martyr
79:The Martyr
75:The Martyr
58:Tannhäuser
866:required)
477:Epithalia
470:Influence
444:The Slave
397:'s novel
379:The Slave
307:The Tryst
245:librettos
160:in 1934.
55:'s opera
46:Biography
825:(2001).
658:(1): 19.
496:See also
391:Zululand
331:Vendetta
255:Epthalia
241:Zululand
212:Vendetta
174:Broadway
131:baritone
127:Carlotta
87:Epthelia
71:Epthelia
36:Epthalia
894:at the
778:Sources
439:cantata
325:Athalia
156:at the
102:soprano
853:
815:
801:
787:
754:
457:ballet
453:Salome
435:My Son
413:, and
387:(1931)
385:Uzziah
344:Voodoo
273:Zuluki
216:Voodoo
178:Voodoo
165:Voodoo
118:Harlem
40:Wagner
674:(PDF)
648:(PDF)
543:Notes
403:Chaka
367:Allah
295:Valdo
851:ISBN
813:ISBN
799:ISBN
785:ISBN
752:ISBN
455:, a
446:, a
437:, a
428:, a
349:WGBS
277:Nada
267:Nada
214:and
182:WGBS
843:doi
42:."
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