About the Composers/Arrangers
Lena Johnson McLin (born September 5, 1928), native of Atlanta, Georgia, was exposed to music at an early age. Her mother served as the Music Director at the Greater Mount Calvary Baptist Church, and her father was the pastor there. During this period, young McLin worked under her mother assisting with worship services directing, composing, and playing piano. Her mother also exposed her to classical music through symphony concerts and operas. Her education furthered while living with her uncle, and “father of gospel,” Thomas A. Dorsey in Chicago. She watched him compose and she herself accompanied acclaimed singers such as Mahalia Jackson and Sallie Martin in his home. McLin received a bachelor’s degree in music from Spelman College in 1951 before relocating to Chicago, and a graduate degree from the American Conservatory of Music. She is also well known as a music educator in the Chicago Public System. She taught there for 36 years and developed a music-major curriculum. She is known as a major influence in well-known artists today in many genres such as R. Kelly, Da Brat, Chaka Khan, Jennifer Hudson, Metropolitan Opera star Mark Rucker who made a recording of her published art songs, Robert Sims, and Tammy McMann. This long list of mentees has given her the title of “the woman who launched a thousand careers.” Outside of the school system, she also founded the McLin Opera Company and McLin Singers, a gospel group she directed, produced a film The Origin of the Spiritual, and wrote a textbook entitled Pulse: A History of Music. In 1981, she founded the Holy Vessel Christian Center and was ordained as a pastor. As a composer, her catalogue comprises over 400 compositions including art songs, choral music, opera, and instrumental works. Her style mirrors her varied education and ranges from classical to gospel, and also includes rock and popular styles. McLin also expresses social activism in several of her pieces such as her cantatas, Free At Last: A Portrait of Martin Luther King Jr., and Gwendolyn Brooks: A Musical Portrait. Rev. Dr. McLin continues to teach students privately and has received numerous awards and honorary degrees for her extended work as a composer and educator.
–Tyrese Byrd
This profile was created in 2021 as part of The Savvy Singer, an EXCEL Lab course at the University of Michigan, School of Music, Theatre, and Dance and a collaboration with the Hampsong Foundation via the Classic Song Research Initiative.
Kalil, Timothy M. “International Dictionary of Black Composers.” Book. Chicago ; London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1999.
Newland, Marti K. “McLin, Lena.” Oxford African American Studies Center. 31 May. 2013; Accessed 22 Sep. 2021.
Roland Carter was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee in 1942. He received his bachelor’s degree in music education at Hampton University. He then went on to receive his master’s from New York University where he studied piano, composition, and choral music.
Beginning in 1965, Carter began working as a professor at Hampton University, eventually become the chair of the department of music, and leading the University’s choir. He stayed at Hampton University until 1989; moving to the University of Tennessee in Chattanooga. He taught there until his retirement in 2013.
Carter devoted his career to highlighting African American composers. From 2003 to 2009, he served as the president of the National Association of Negro Musicians. He also has a publishing company called MAR-VEL where he publishes choral compositions by African American composers. His work brought him to Carnegie Hall, where he conducted the venue’s first-ever African American music series.
Carter received an honorary doctorate from Shaw University, and has donated his archive to his former place of work at the University of Tennessee.
-Lucy Koukoudian
This profile was created during the 2023-2024 academic year as part of the Song of America Fellowship Program, a project of the Classic Song Research Initiative between the Hampsong Foundation and the University of Michigan, School of Music, Theatre, and Dance.
Jacqueline Hairston is a pianist, composer-arranger, and vocal coach. A native of Charlotte, North Carolina, Hairston received her musical training at the Juilliard School and Howard University School of Music. She earned a Masters degree in music and music education from Columbia University in New York City. Her works have been recorded by the London Symphony and the Columbia Symphony. Among ensembles and soloists who have performed her works live are the San Francisco Women’s Philharmonic, Linda Tillery and the Cultural Heritage Choir, Kathleen Battle (with the Collegiate Chorale and Pro Arte Chorale at Carnegie Hall), the Metropolitan Opera, mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves, and the Orlando Opera Chorus and Orchestra. Ms. Hairston received a “Living Legend Award” from the California State University at Dominquez Hills and received Oakland ‘s “Living Legend Award” by the Oakland Alliance of Black Educators. Her compositions include musical settings for the inspirational words of Howard Thurman, her chaplain at Howard University. In 2001, Ms. Hairston was artist-in-residence at Northern Illinois University. During this time, she conducted classes culminating in a choir concert that commemorated her famed cousin, the late Dr. Jester Hairston, who inspired her mission to create choral arrangements of spirituals. Her recent teaching posts have included Oakland’s New School for the Arts, the University of Creation Spirituality and the University of California at Berkeley’s Young Musicians’ Program.
–Helen Bryant
This profile was created in 2022 as part of the Song of America Fellowship Program, a project of the Classic Song Research Initiative between the Hampsong Foundation and the University of Michigan, School of Music, Theatre, and Dance.
Further Reading:
-Li, Er-Hsuan, and Alejandro Cremaschi. 2022. “”Great Day” Ode, By Jacqueline Hairston | Hidden Voices: Piano Music By Black Women Composers | University Of Colorado Boulder”. Colorado.Edu. Accessed March 31. https://www.colorado.edu/project/hidden-voices/2021/10/25/great-day-ode-jacqueline-hairston.
-“Jacqueline Hairston”. 2022. African American Art Song Alliance. Accessed March 31. https://artsongalliance.org/composers/jacqueline-hairston.
Hailing from Cowpens, South Carolina, Uzee Brown Jr. is a multifaceted musician who has been a major figure in African American classical music for the past thirty-five years. He is a former president of the National Association of Negro Musicians, co-founder of Onyx Opera Atlanta (a non-profit operatic ensemble which seeks to perform works by African-American composers alongside western European operatic repertoire), and is the chair of the Division of Creative and Performing Arts at one of the foremost traditionally Black colleges in the United States, Morehouse College.
As a performer, Brown was a part of the world premiere of Scott Joplin’s opera Treemonisha, where he played Parson Alltalk. His focus on African American music is also deeply ingrained in his compositions and arrangements, which includes commissions of protest songs, arrangements of previously unarranged spiritual melodies, and more. He studied composition with T.J. Anderson, African American folk music with Wendell P. Whalum, and African American Art Song with Willis Patterson.
–Jack Morin
This profile was created during the 2023-2024 academic year as part of the Song of America Fellowship Program, a project of the Classic Song Research Initiative between the Hampsong Foundation and the University of Michigan, School of Music, Theatre, and Dance.
Bibliography:
.“.” Contemporary Black Biography. . Encyclopedia.Com. 19 Sep. 2023 .” Encyclopedia.Com, Encyclopedia.com, 26 Sept. 2023, www.encyclopedia.com/education/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/brown-uzee-jr-1950.
“Uzee Brown.” Uzee Brown Society of Choraliers, www.uzeebrownchoraliers.com/uzeebrown. Accessed 26 Sept. 2023.
“Artist – Uzee Brown Jr..” GIA Publications – Sacred Choral Music, Hymnals, Recordings and Educations Materials, Roman Catholic, Christian, www.giamusic.com/store/artists/uzee-brown. Accessed 26 Sept. 2023.
Bio from https://songofamerica.net/composer/brown-jr/ .