Getting Started…on Tobacco Road...

The subject of this initial blog posting has nothing to do with tobacco or roads, but is, quite remarkably about the notion of "the history of cello playing and teaching among Americans of color", which is a road-oriented process and experience.

I have been pondering and fidgeting starting a blog on cello history, and after reading several posts on my fellow A-A cellist, friend and colleague Robert Clemens's blog page (once I was finished laughing hysterically!!) began poking around the web to see how easy this "evil act" might turn out to be!! :)

I come from a long line of church folk, public school teachers, historians, humorists and musicians so please fasten your seat belts as a few of my posts may wax theological, pedagogical, historical (and hysterical!!), and definitely musical.

My interest in the African-American presence in cello history is not new; it began in my formative years of playing, where like most adolescents I was looking for role models who were cellists but also looked like me or were at least walking paths that resembled the one I could see ahead of me.  That led to me two names, eventually: Kermit Moore (1929-2013) and Donald White (1925-2005). Donald White was a member of the cello section of the Cleveland Orchestra, joining the membership in 1957 having come from the Hartford (CT) Symphony.  Kermit Moore was a renowned cellist, composer and conductor who lived and worked in New York City for more than fifty years.

The next place I was led to, quite unexpectedly, was the appendix of Louis Potter's book the The Art of Cello Playing (1965).  Potter was one of my "grand-teachers" during my adolescent years in Lansing, Michigan.  The Suite of Howard Swanson is listed in the appendix of violoncello repertoire; I can't recall what (beyond my simple recognition of the English language, derivative as hell that it is!!) drew me into a state of further curiosity about Swanson, but off I slowly went in search of Howard.  Well, by the time I found out that Howard Swanson had lived and studied in Cleveland, Ohio…I was an undergraduate student at Baldwin-Wallace College (now University) in Berea--on the southwest "fringe" of Cleveland!!  I also ordered a copy of the score and part to the Suite while studying there.

To shorten an opening "long story"…my exploration and efforts to acquaint, study, practice, perform and dare to champion the cello, chamber and orchestral music of African-American composers as a facet of the hodgepodge of activities that most of us deign to call a "career"...began with this work.

I cordially invite all who wish or dare to join me on this exploration and investigation of this "unknown history". Peace…

Timothy W. Holley, A.Mus.D.