As a stand-alone piece, Lyric quickly became one of the most regularly programmed works by a living composer. 1 in 1946 as a graduate student at the Curtis Institute, and dedicated it to his grandmother, who had died the previous year.Īfter its 1946 premiere, Walker excerpted the second movement and gave it a new title, Lyric for Strings. Like Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, Walker’s Lyric for Strings (initially titled Lament for Strings), began as a movement for string quartet. In 1996, Walker became the first Black composer to win the Pulitzer Prize in Music for his Lilacs for Voice and Orchestra, a setting of Walt Whitman’s poem, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d.” Upon hearing about the prize, conductor Zubin Mehta exclaimed, “This composer has finally gotten the recognition he deserves.” In 2000, Walker was elected to the American Classical Music Hall of Fame, the first living composer so honored. Walker’s life list of accomplishments includes many more “firsts:” he was the first Black instrumentalist to play a recital in New York’s Town Hall the first Black soloist to perform with the Philadelphia Orchestra under Eugene Ormandy, and the first Black instrumentalist to obtain major concert management, with National Concert Artists. in composition, the first Black to do so. Walker continued his education at the Eastman School of Music, where he earned a D.M.A. At Curtis, Walker studied piano with Rudolf Serkin and composition with Gian Carlo Menotti. After graduating from Oberlin Conservatory, Walker attended the Curtis Institute, becoming the first Black student to earn an Artist’s Diploma in piano and composition. Hailed by Fanfare in 2015 as “one of the greatest composers of our time,” George Theophilus Walker achieved renown in performance, composition, and teaching over the course of his long career. Most recent Oregon Symphony performance: James DePreist led the Oregon Symphony on January 14, 2001
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