Judith Anne Still: 'I would like to start a Gershwin boycott among African-Americans'

[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)]

Judith Anne Still is the daughter of William Grant Still (1895-1978). She operates William Grant Still Music, which offers recordings sheet music and books, including the new autobiography, My Life, My Words. She writes of response to its publication:

“Judging from comments, especially from African-Americans, about MY LIFE, MY WORDS, I see that the cat is finally out of the bag and in print. Everybody has always known that Gershwin stole his music, but no one would say anything, because Gershwin seemed to be the only door that opened for performers of color. (Dr. Everett Jones pointed out to me that part of PORGY was stolen from Cab Calloway).

“The laws against segregation were passed because of bus boycotts: I would like to start a Gershwin boycott among African-Americans, challenging every musician and performer of color to refuse to perform in Porgy, or for any Gershwin piece, from now on. If all agree, we can finally force orchestras and opera companies to do works by real Afro-Americans which are not demeaning in the way that Gershwin is demeaning.”

Comment by email from Dr. Everett N. Jones III:

"Please clarify in the post that Gershwin got the idea for Sportin' Life (a character in Porgy and Bess) from Cab Calloway." [Dr. Everett N. Jones III is Assistant Professor of Piano at Wilberforce University]

'My Life, My Words: The Autobiography of William Grant Still' Now Available from William Grant Still Music

[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) ]

We have just acquired a copy of My Life, My Words: The Autobiography of William Grant Still, American Master Composer, with additional material by Judith Anne Still. Future posts will explore the book in greater depth, but we want to immediately let readers know that the book has been published, by The Master-Player Library of Flagstaff, and can be purchased from William Grant Still Music, http://www.williamgrantstill.com, which is operated by Judith Anne Still, the composer's daughter. The book is in hardcover and is priced at $19.95. Judith Anne Still writes in the Introduction:

”This monograph is of a formerly neglected manuscript, misplaced in a box of photocopies of In One Lifetime, my mother's biography of William Grant Still. It is a part of the autobiography of Still, written entirely by the composer himself.

“In the late 1930s and 1940s, my mother, Verna Arvey, asked my father to write his life story up until the time that she became his publicist (circa 1934). He typed one-hundred-fifty-one pages of his recollections about his career, and my mother cut sections out and used them in developing her biography of her husband.”

“The version of In One Lifetime that was published in 1984 only included about fifty pages of the composer's original one-hundred-fifty-one-page manuscript. What was left to be discovered seventy years later were memories that were perhaps deemed too private, or of too little significance, to be passed on to the public.

“What follows here, then, is what is left of Still's own story—the untold story—an absolutely fascinating eyewitness account of Still's life, from the turn-of-the-century to 1934.” “Because much of the story is missing in the first third of the manuscript, having been included in the Arvey biography, some background material is inserted in italics where there are gaps in the narrative.” “There never has been, and never will be, another book on William Grant Still quite like this one.” [William Grant Still (1895-1978) is profiled at AfriClassical.com, where a complete Works Lists by Prof. Dominique-René de Lerma is featured.]