The Spiritual Aftermath

After Dvořák’s eventual departure from the National Conservatory in 1895, the New World Symphony continued to be a flash point in discussions about the relationships between African American and European American music and musicians, particularly the repertoire known as “Negro spirituals.” White American-born composers, such as Henry F. Gilbert and John Powell, continued to complain about lack of representation on concert programs while failing to support their Black counterparts, who leveraged relationships with figures inside and outside the musical world to create new social networks for finding professional success. In the early 1930s, William Dawson and Florence Price became the first Black composers to premiere symphonies drawing musical inspiration from early African American vernacular song and dance.