George Walker’s Sonata for Cello and Piano: first movement
This February, the Daily Classical Music Post celebrates Black composers and musicians whose music has been suppressed and ignored. All of these musicians should be added to the music history and music theory curriculum. https://youtu.be/IjXhgKlFSOc George Walker (1922–2018) was the first Black composer to win a Pulitzer Prize in Music (Scott Joplin’s posthumous award in 1976 notwithstanding). Walker won in 1996 with Lilacs, for soprano and orchestra. He also was the first Black instrumentalist to solo with the Philadelphia Orchestra. Walker first studied piano and organ at Oberlin, and after graduating went to Curtis, where he studied piano, chamber music, and composition. He was the first Black musician to graduate from Curtis, receiving his Artist Diplomas in piano and composition in 1945. He later studied in Paris with Nadia Boulanger on a Fulbright Fellowship and a John Hay Whitney Fellowship. Jeffrey Mumford recalled, “[Boulanger] was so impressed with his musicianship that she w...