Undine smith moore biography
Undine smith moore biography
Undine smith moore biography children...
Who was Undine Smith Moore? Discover the life and music of the ‘Dean of Black Women Composers’
21 October 2020, 16:18
Exploring the life and music of a renowned African American educator and composer, whose oratorio based on the life of Martin Luther King Jr was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
Meet Undine Smith Moore, a 20th-century composer and prolific music educator.
In 1904 in the state of Virginia, Undine was born to African American parents James William Smith and Hardie Turnbull Smith, whose own parents had been slaves.
The Smiths’ lives were filled with music – whether at home or singing in church. According to Helen Walker-Hill’s From Spirituals to Symphonies: African-American Women Composers and Their Music, Undine once said of her childhood, “above all else, music reigned”.
Undine trained as a classical pianist, but her heart lay in vocal music.
As a composer and arranger, she would go on to write numerous choral works, many of them inspired by African spirit