Six Composers of Nineteenth-Century New Orleans

Abstract

The composers discussed in this essay belonged to a distinct social and ethnic class in nineteenth-century New Orleans known variously as free persons of color, gens de couleur libre, and black Creoles. Aside from their mutual concern for economic survival, the citizens of this group were joined together by the French language, their interest in French culture, and their membership in the Catholic Church. They attended performances of the opera and of concert music and maintained a strong devotion to music and the arts. They encouraged their children to study music without the intention of pursuing it as a career. Since they were people of reasonable financial means, they often sent their children away to the best schools in the northeastern United States, France, and other European countries to be educated. Although they were given certain freedoms, they were not accorded the same social, political, and economic position as whites. After the Civil War, the implementation of oppressive Jim Crow laws posed greater difficulties for them. For instance, a famous law suit of 1869 contested segregated seating in the St. Charles Theatre, while prior to the Civil War, seats in theaters were available to any citizen who could purchase a ticket. Moreover, the Louisiana legislature enacted a specific code that mandated that a person with any amount of African blood was, according to law, a Negro. The effect of the new restrictions was that all persons of African descent in New Orleans-free blacks, former slaves, and Creolescame together in expressing their vocal opposition to the legalized burdens imposed on them. It was against this social and political background that several talented composers emerged.