William Grant Still Autobiography: 'Though my father died when he was only twenty-four, he left me a sizable legacy for my education'

[My Life, My Words: The Autobiography of William Grant Still, American Master Composer; With additional material by Judith Anne Still; The Master-Player Library, Flagstaff, Arizona (2011) ]

On June 9,2011 AfriClassical posted: “'My Life, My Words: The Autobiography of William Grant Still' Now Available from William Grant Still Music.” We quoted from the Introduction, and explained that the book may be purchased from William Grant Still Music for $19.95. Chapter I is entitled The Family Tree. It opens with these words from the composer's daughter, Judith Anne Still, whose contributions to the book are in italics:

“We do not know for sure what thoughts William Grant Still expressed in the beginning of his autobiography, because the opening seven pages of the manuscript are missing. Even so, the material that follows the seven lost pages clearly indicates that the composer started his narrative with his family ancestry, and with candid discussions of the racial inequities in the Antebellum South.

“From what we have learned of the Still family history outside of the autobiography, we can be certain that their story began with the Scotch-Irish Burton family in Kentucky. Wilson Burton, Sr. (1779-1825) and Eleanor Gray Bruce (1778-1862) lived in Kentucky in the first decade of the 19th century. They moved their growing family to Wilkinson County, Mississippi, in the far southwest corner of the State, during the early months of 1811.”

Judith Anne Still gives examples of racially motivated violence affecting William Grant Still, Sr. On one occasion he dismissed the students before a mob reached the school, burned it to the ground, and fatally shot the other teacher, also African American. The cause was a complaint by the teacher who was murdered, about his salary being less than that of White teachers. William Grant Still, Sr. was poisoned and died on September 26, 1895. His son, who was to become a composer, was five months old. William Grant Still, Jr. writes of his father:

“Though my father died when he was only twenty-four, he left me a sizable legacy for my education at Oberlin. He did this by teaching, by being the financier and regulating the affairs every Saturday of a small grocery business run daily by his friend Harry Anderson, and in other ways. His activities were many. Before his marriage, every cent went toward his own education. Afterward, it was saved for mine.” [William Grant Still (1895-1978) is profiled at AfriClassical.com, which features a comprehensive Works List by Prof. Dominique-René de Lerma of Lawrence University Conservatory]