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Article: They too compose America: the Black Music Repertory Ensemble and contemporary formal music.
- Article from:
- American Visions
- Article date:
- August 1, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1996 Heritage Information Holdings, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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In 1995 the American Academy of Arts and Letters elected 10 new members, honoring them with the highest formal recognition of artistic merit in the nation. Some of the names of the new inductees, such as satirical cartoonist Jules Feiffer and playwright August Wilson, may have sounded familiar - but who is Olly Wilson?
Say "American music" or "black music," and the names Scott Joplin, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald roll off die tongue. Once we leave the vernacular tradition, however, only William Grant Still (see American Visions August/September 1995) rings the occasional bell of memory in a land where rock `n' roll has ruled for four decades and where black ...