Hardcover, ISBN: 0-9653308-4-2, November 1997, 218 p., 25 illustrations, U.S. $24.95.
Music has sustained the hearts, souls, and minds of African-Americans through formidable challenges living in this nation. Whether performing in joy, grief, hope, love, labor, or spirituality, their unique lyric expressions have remained an integral part of daily life, from hearth, to field, school, and church. Black churches were a vehicle notably fostering music’s predominance in worship and the community. With this rise in the artform’s import, church musicians and music teachers were simultaneously elevated in public stature. Ironically, despite holding distinct roles in African-American culture, few depictions of their lives exist.
An inspired effort filling this void, Dedicated to Music gives detailed profiles of thirty-three church musicians and music teachers, who sustained southern New Jersey African-American musical traditions for nearly all of the twentieth century. As a prelude sets the stage for an oratorio or suite, Clement A. Price’s insightful essay, Composing The Community: Blacks Making and Teaching Music in Southern New Jersey, succinctly captures the historical relevance of these native born and Great Migration New Jerseyans, within the local, regional, and national context. The book’s focal point is co-author Henrietta Fuller Robinson’s delightful narrative. Inspired by her great love for music, Henrietta has engaged in this art form for virtually the entire ninety-three years of her life. In southern New Jersey she spent almost sixty years fashioning an extraordinary professional music career, functioning as music teacher, pianist, organist, choir director, and talent promoter. Remarkably, she was also the very last active music teacher from her generation of multi-talented, classically trained black church musicians. Dedicated to Music’s biographical dictionary encompasses the diversity of experiences of thirty-two of Henrietta’s peers. This substantial documentation of a cross section of music professionals aptly completes this edifying study.
CONTENTS
Dedication and Acknowledgements ...................................viii
Preface .................................................................................ix
INTRODUCTION ............................................................xi
Composing The Community: Blacks Making and Teaching Music in Southern New Jersey ..................................xii
PART ONE .........................................................................1
Henrietta Fuller Robinson: A Life Dedicated to Music ........3
PART TWO ......................................................................27
African American Church Musicians and Music Teachers in
Southern New Jersey, 1915-1990: A Biographical Dictionary
Abbreviations .........................................................................29
Allison, Theodora M. .............................................................30
Ambrose, Stanley G. ...............................................................34
Blair, Ellen Dixon-Hodge .......................................................40
Brown, Emily Lucken .............................................................42
Collins, Isabelle M. ................................................................49
Davis, S. Edward ....................................................................55
Durham, Alice Baughn ...........................................................62
Evers, Maxine Monroe ............................................................66
Fernandez (Fernanders), Juanita Alvera ...................................68
Foster, Allen William Sr. .........................................................71
Fraction, Edward Arthur Jr. ....................................................74
Givens, Audrey Canois ...........................................................78
Hamilton, Jesse I. Jr. ...............................................................81
Hamilton, Jesse I. Sr. ..............................................................85
Harris, Lois Custis ..................................................................91
Holmes, Roberta Jones ...........................................................94
Ingram, N. Henry Sr. .............................................................97
James, Lottie Price ................................................................100
King, Betty Jackson ..............................................................103
Little, J. Ferman ...................................................................106
McDonald, Sue Smith ..........................................................110
Outlaw, Laura Beeks .............................................................117
Payne, J. Christopher ............................................................119
Puggsley, Carline Lewis .........................................................123
Richardson, Iona Davis ........................................................125
Voorhees, Essie Holmes ........................................................128
Watson, Myrtle Van Buren ...................................................131
Wheeler, James Marshall .......................................................134
Wilson, Rosanna "Rose" Payne .............................................138
Wormack, Mabel Hopkins ...................................................142
Worthington, Ruth Roberts .................................................144
Young, Walter Louis Sr. ........................................................146
PART THREE ................................................................153
Appendixes .................................................................154
Bibliography ...............................................................165
Index ..........................................................................175
What makes this book so special?
With the publication of Dedicated to Music: The Legacy of African American Church Musicians and Music Teachers in Southern New Jersey, 1915-1990, the importance of memory in documenting the history of modern black New Jersey life and culture is given center stage...Not since the Camden County Historical Society’s 1984 publication, The Black Experience in Southern New Jersey, have the internal dynamics of black communities in southern New Jersey received such attention, nor is there a more carefully detailed portrait of individuals in those places.
–– Clement Alexander Price, Ph.D.
Significantly...reclaims and honors the less-celebrated, but vitally important, figures in Delaware Valley African American musical history. The people within this volume have demonstrated a commitment, not only to music, but to their community as a whole. They are the guardians of the African American musical tradition that we so often take for granted. When we focus on the famous "stars," sometimes we forget the legions of music teachers, choir directors, vocal coaches, and others who commit their talent in service to the community. This commendable text upholds the tradition of musical and community guardianship.
–– Ella Forbes, Ph.D.
Every seriously creative African-American musician, whether aware or not, owes the deepest possible debt of gratitude to church musicians in general: but especially to musicians such as those who are profiled in Dedicated to Music. This accurate, scholarly, and highly informative book deserves widespread educational use, and its authors a joyous song of praise.
–– Roland Wiggins, Mus.D
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