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The composer Avril Coleridge-Taylor always bore the burden of her family reputation. As the daughter of the renowned Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, among the best-known English artists of the turn of the 20th century, the composer’s identity was shrouded in the long shadows of history.

The First Recording

Not long ago, I reflected on these legacies as I prepared to record the first-ever recording of the composer’s 1936 piano concerto. With its impassioned harmonies, heartfelt tunes, and valiant rhythms, this piece will grant new listeners fascinating insight into how the composer – an artist in conflict who entered the world in 1903 – conceived of her world as a female composer of color.

Past and Present

But here’s the thing about legacies. It can take a while to acclimate, to see shapes as they really are, to separate fact from misrepresentation, and I was reluctant to address her history for some time.

I earnestly desired Avril to be her father’s daughter. Partially, this was true. The rustic British sounds of Samuel’s influence can be observed in several pieces, including From the Hills (1934) and Sussex Landscape (1940). Yet it suffices to review the names of her father’s compositions to realize how he heard himself as both a standard-bearer of British Romantic style as well as a advocate of the African diaspora.

This was where parent and child began to differ.

White America judged Samuel by the mastery of his compositions rather than the his racial background.

Parental Heritage

While he was studying at the renowned institution, Samuel – the child of a Sierra Leonean father and a British mother – started to lean into his African roots. Once the poet of color this literary figure came to London in 1897, the young musician actively pursued him. He adapted the poet’s African Romances into music and the following year adapted his verses for an opera, Dream Lovers. This was followed by the choral work that made him famous: Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast.

Inspired by this American writer’s The Song of Hiawatha, Samuel’s Hiawatha was an global success, especially with African Americans who felt shared pride as the majority assessed his work by the excellence of his compositions instead of the his race.

Activism and Politics

Success did not reduce his activism. At the turn of the century, he participated in the First Pan African Conference in London where he made the acquaintance of the African American intellectual the renowned Du Bois and saw a variety of discussions, covering the subjugation of Black South Africans. He was an activist to his final days. He kept connections with trailblazers for equality including this intellectual and the educator Washington, gave addresses on racial equality, and even engaged in dialogue on issues of racism with the US President during an invitation to the US capital in the early 1900s. Regarding his compositions, the scholar reflected, “he wrote his name so high as a composer that it cannot soon be forgotten.” He succumbed in that year, at 37 years old. Yet how might her father have made of his offspring’s move to be in South Africa in the mid-20th century?

Controversy and Apartheid

“Offspring of Renowned Musician gives OK to S African Bias,” ran a headline in the community journal Jet magazine. Apartheid “appeared to me the right policy”, Avril told Jet. When pushed to clarify, she revised her statement: she didn’t agree with the system “in principle” and it “should be allowed to run its course, guided by good-intentioned residents of every background”. Were the composer more attuned to her father’s politics, or raised in Jim Crow America, she may have reconsidered about apartheid. Yet her life had shielded her.

Heritage and Innocence

“I have a UK passport,” she stated, “and the authorities never asked me about my race.” So, with her “fair” skin (as described), she floated alongside white society, buoyed up by their acclaim for her deceased parent. She gave a talk about her family’s work at the Cape Town university and conducted the South African Broadcasting Corporation Orchestra in the city, featuring the heroic third movement of her concerto, titled: “Dedicated to my Father.” Even though a confident pianist personally, she avoided playing as the lead performer in her work. Rather, she invariably directed as the leader; and so the apartheid orchestra followed her lead.

She desired, as she stated, she “might bring a change”. Yet in the mid-1950s, circumstances deteriorated. Once officials learned of her mixed background, she could no longer stay the nation. Her UK document offered no defense, the UK representative urged her to go or risk imprisonment. She came home, feeling great shame as the magnitude of her naivety dawned. “This experience was a hard one,” she lamented. Adding to her embarrassment was the 1955 publication of her controversial discussion, a year after her sudden departure from that nation.

A Recurring Theme

As I sat with these memories, I sensed a known narrative. The narrative of being British until it’s challenged – that brings to mind African-descended soldiers who served for the British during the World War II and lived only to be denied their due compensation. And the Windrush generation,