Shelter Island Reporter: 'Baritone Thom Milton and organist Linda Betjeman' in works of H. T. Burleigh July 17, Union Chapel

[ABOVE: Union Chapel in the Grove, Shelter Island Heights, New York 11965 BELOW: Deep River: Songs and Spirituals; Oral Moses, bass-baritone; Ann Sears, piano; Troy 332 (1999)]

Music of the African American composer Henry Thacker Burleigh (1866-1949) will be part of the Camp Quinipet Sunday service July 17, 2011:

Shelter Island Reporter
Quinipet celebrated at Union Chapel
By Judy Inglis
July 13, 2011
“Union Chapel in the Grove welcomes the Reverend Dr. Karen A. Monk, Pastor, Kaaterskill & East Jewett United Methodist Churches, to preach at the Camp Quinipet Sunday service on July 17 at 10:30 a.m. Her sermon is titled 'Tending the Fertile Soul.'

“Baritone Thom Milton and organist Linda Betjeman will present the music of Scott Soper and H. T. Burleigh at Sunday’s service.”

Henry “Harry” Thacker Burleigh was born Dec. 2, 1866 and is profiled at AfriClassical.com, which features a complete Works List by Prof. Dominique-René de Lerma, http://www.CasaMusicaledeLerma.com H. T. Burleigh, as the composer is often called, was an African American composer, arranger and baritone soloist who was born in Erie, Pennsylvania on December 2, 1866.

Prof. De Lerma credits Burleigh with introducing the concept of the spiritual as art song, and says he was programming his own works in conjunction with those of others by 1912. Major awards included the Spingarn Medal of the NAACP in 1917 and the Harmon Award. In his lengthy career, Burleigh wrote 265 vocal works and made 187 choral arrangements. In 1916 he published Jubilee Songs of the United States of America, a book of arrangements of spirituals for solo vocal performance. Henry "Harry" Thacker Burleigh entered a nursing home in 1946, and died in Stamford, Connecticut on December 12, 1949.