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This talented musician always bore the weight of her parent’s heritage. As the offspring of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, one of the prominent UK musicians of the early 20th century, the composer’s reputation was shrouded in the lingering obscurity of history.

A World Premiere

Not long ago, I contemplated these legacies as I got ready to make the first-ever recording of the composer’s concerto for piano composed in 1936. With its intense musical themes, heartfelt tunes, and confident beats, this piece will grant music lovers fascinating insight into how this artist – a composer during war born in 1903 – envisioned her world as a female composer of color.

Past and Present

Yet about legacies. It can take a while to adjust, to see shapes as they actually appear, to separate fact from misrepresentation, and I felt hesitant to confront Avril’s past for a while.

I deeply hoped Avril to be a reflection of her father. Partially, this was true. The pastoral English palettes of parental inspiration can be observed in several pieces, such as From the Hills (1934) and Sussex Landscape (1940). However, one need only examine the headings of her parent’s works to see how he heard himself as both a champion of British Romantic style as well as a representative of the African diaspora.

At this point father and daughter seemed to diverge.

The United States judged Samuel by the excellence of his compositions instead of the his racial background.

Samuel’s African Roots

During his studies at the renowned institution, her father – the offspring of a parent from Sierra Leone and a Caucasian parent – began embracing his background. When the Black American writer this literary figure arrived in England in that era, the 21-year-old composer actively pursued him. He composed this literary work into music and the following year incorporated his poetry for a stage piece, Dream Lovers. Subsequently arrived the choral work that put Samuel on the map: Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast.

Drawing from this American writer’s The Song of Hiawatha, this composition was an international hit, particularly among the Black community who felt indirect honor as white America assessed his work by the excellence of his art rather than the his background.

Principles and Actions

Fame did not reduce his beliefs. In 1900, he attended the pioneering African conference in England where he met the Black American thinker the renowned Du Bois and observed a variety of discussions, including on the oppression of the Black community there. He was an activist until the end. He sustained relationships with early civil rights leaders including Du Bois and this leader, delivered his own speeches on racial equality, and even engaged in dialogue on racial problems with President Theodore Roosevelt while visiting to the presidential residence in the early 1900s. As for his music, the scholar reflected, “he established his reputation so notably as a composer that it cannot soon be forgotten.” He died in that year, aged 37. Yet how might the composer have made of his offspring’s move to travel to South Africa in the mid-20th century?

Conflict and Policy

“Child of Celebrated Artist expresses approval to South African policy,” declared a title in the community journal Jet magazine. This policy “struck me as the right policy”, the composer stated Jet. Upon further questioning, she revised her statement: she did not support with apartheid “in principle” and it “should be allowed to resolve itself, guided by well-meaning residents of diverse ethnicities”. Had Avril been more in tune to her family’s principles, or raised in the US under segregation, she could have hesitated about this system. Yet her life had sheltered her.

Heritage and Innocence

“I possess a British passport,” she stated, “and the government agents failed to question me about my ethnicity.” Thus, with her “porcelain-white” skin (as described), she traveled among the Europeans, lifted by their admiration for her deceased parent. She gave a talk about her father’s music at the University of Cape Town and conducted the South African Broadcasting Corporation Orchestra in Johannesburg, including the inspiring part of her composition, subtitled: “In memory of my Father.” Even though a confident pianist on her own, she avoided playing as the soloist in her piece. Rather, she always led as the maestro; and so the apartheid orchestra followed her lead.

The composer aspired, according to her, she “may foster a change”. But by 1954, circumstances deteriorated. Once officials learned of her African heritage, she had to depart the country. Her British passport didn’t protect her, the British high commissioner advised her to leave or risk imprisonment. She returned to England, embarrassed as the scale of her inexperience became clear. “The lesson was a hard one,” she stated. Increasing her embarrassment was the printing that year of her controversial discussion, a year after her forced leaving from South Africa.

A Familiar Story

While I reflected with these shadows, I sensed a known narrative. The story of being British until it’s revoked – which recalls African-descended soldiers who served for the British during the second world war and survived only to be refused rightful benefits. And the Windrush generation,