When it comes to classical music, few composers, conductors and musicians are Black, and the contributions of those who are have been overlooked, mainly due to racism. According to the League of American Orchestras, only about 4% of conductors and less than 2% of musicians in orchestras in the U.S. are Black.
On Thursday, music historian Patricia Ann Neely will join a concert featuring 18th-century Baroque classical music at the Charlotte Museum of History and discuss the works of people of color during that period.
The internationally acclaimed Neely — the first person of color to play the viola da gamba professionally — will play with the North Carolina Baroque Orchestra during the event.
Neely talked with WFAE’s Gwendolyn Glenn about the racism she experienced over her career and how her love for classical music started at a young age, growing up in Harlem.
“My mother was a real classical music opera enthusiast and I grew up as the geek of the neighborhood because that’s all I listened to,” Neely said. “She said she would sit me down as a toddler and I’d immediately quiet down listening to opera.”
Neely began taking piano lessons when she was 7 and said she was often teased by her young peers for her love of classical music.
“Despite the taunts, I loved listening to this music … Every time there was a thunderstorm, I’d ask my mother to put on Beethoven’s 6th Symphony. The music spoke to me not just for its sound but how it made me feel,” Neely said.
Neely went on to attend the High School of Music & Art in New York City. There, she said she finally found a place where she felt comfortable and thrived.
“I met others just like me of all persuasions. It was a sanctuary, the one place we didn’t encounter discrimination based on race because we were all respective of our talents,” Neely said.
Neely was a pre-med major in college but switched to majoring in music. She played numerous instruments, but in her sophomore year at Vassar College, decided to focus solely on the viola da gamba, a bowed string instrument, played on the leg, that dates back to the Renaissance and Baroque periods.
“My choir director’s wife played the viola da gamba and her group did the Saint Matthew Passion (by Bach) and I heard the solo of the viola da gamba and fell in love with it,” she said.
Neely said as a student, her classes did not include instruction on Black classical musicians, composers and conductors, such as Joseph Bolonge, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, a prolific violinist and composer who wrote six operas during the 1700s, often compared to Mozart.
“I didn’t hear of any Black classical artists as a student and certainly not him, Neely said.
She says she was influenced mainly by 17th- and 18th-century German classical music, 16th- and 17th-century Italian classical compositions and the late contemporary jazz artist Billy Taylor, a North Carolina native and former NPR host.
“Billy Taylor lived in my building on the first floor and I used to come home and wait for the elevator and I could hear the percussionist of his piano and his trio rehearsing in their apartment,” Neely said. “When I changed my major from pre-med to music and my father said, “What makes you think you can be a musician,” and I my answer was “Billy Taylor is.”
Above, Neely playing her rendition of Susanna un jour passagieta, her favorite classical composition.
When Neely began her professional career, she was the only professional viola da gamba Black musician and because of discrimination, she says she found it hard to be taken seriously.
“The way I was approached when someone met me was that I couldn’t have any training in this and I had to prove myself. Some people said we don’t see you as a professional,” Neely said. “People patted me on the back and wouldn’t let me in that environment except on occasion to play for a group that I wanted to be a (full time) member of.”
Neely took her talent to Germany and other parts of Europe as a member of the acclaimed medieval ensemble, Sequentia.
“When I returned to New York, I began to get more work because of my work with the ensemble, which was very well known and respected,” Neely said.
Neely has traveled the world over the years with her viola da gamba, mesmerizing audiences, and playing with ensembles such as the Smithsonian Chamber Orchestra and Viol Consort, Tempesta di Mare, and the Washington Bach Consort, among others. She will perform Thursday from 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the Charlotte Museum of History with the North Carolina Baroque Orchestra and also give a talk on Black classical composers, musicians and conductors.
The event is part of the museum’s celebration of the 250th anniversary of the 1774 Rock House, Mecklenburg County’s oldest home and the only house in Charlotte still standing from the time of the American Revolution.
