An Opportunity to Rise: Reinterpreting Esther, the Beautiful Queen

Abstract

In 1934, Zora Neale Hurston wrote that "the Negro is a very original being. While he lives and moves in the midst of a white civilization, everything that be touches is reinterpreted for his own use" (304). Of all modes of cultural expression, the reinterpretation of music by African Americans has been especially prevalent and compelling, as composer Olly Wilson describes: For several hundred years now since our forefathers' involuntary departure from the homeland, black people have been adapting machines in the American environment to suit their purposes. Everything from food and dress to language and religion has been adapted to conform to an essentially African way of doing things. Nowhere has this adaptation been truer than in music .... The point here is that, as in African Bantu philosophy, a thing is given meaning only by the will of a human being. The media is a vehicle of expression, not the substance of expression. Since the substance stems from the wellsprings of the individual, the media may be derived, therefore, from any source. (1973, 36) Taking Wilson's assertion as a starting point, how might African Americans have adapted music, written by a white composer for white performers and audiences, "to suit their purposes?" In the discussion to follow, I consider aspects of African-American reinterpretation of one such work--the choral drama Esther, the Beautiful Queen, written by William Bradbury in 1856. In the very least, the association of black singers with this piece simultaneously disrupted and transcended Bradbury's original intentions and thus, their performances assumed activist purpose. By extension, then, African-American performances of Esther challenged Eurocentric interpretive expectations and standards. In addition, the text of this work, based on the book of Esther, became a vehicle of specialized sociopolitical and spiritual messages. To illustrate these points, I consider three performances of this work that took place in the nineteenth century. The earliest of these, by the Fisk Singers in 1871, may have been the first time an African-American ensemble staged this work. Next, I turn to performances of Esther in Washington, D.C., and Montgomery, Alabama, in the 1880s, under the direction of soprano Amelia L. Tilghman. A teacher and aspiring concert artist, Tilghman organized and managed her productions, rehearsed singers, and starred in the title role. The final performance under consideration took place in New York's famous Daly's Theatre, where the Hampton Singers performed Esther in 1893. William Bradbury and Esther Perhaps no other American musician cultivated and achieved the popularity and prominent commercial and pedagogical profile enjoyed by William Batchelder Bradbury (1816-68) during the middle decades of the nineteenth century. Born in Maine to parents dedicated to amateur music making, Bradbury began music lessons as child. In his youth he enrolled at Lowell Mason's Boston Academy of Music. By 1840 he had established himself in New York City where he served as a church organist and choir director. He also began publishing tune-book collections of popular religious and secular songs and teaching pieces. In 1847 he traveled to Europe for additional music instruction and spent two years working with celebrated teachers, mostly in Leipzig. After returning to the United States, Bradbury accepted a prestigious post as music director of New York's Broadway Tabemacle. Committed to the promotion of universal music literacy, Bradbury toured throughout the United States, teaching students of "all classes--from the children of the millionaire as well as from among the children of the laborer" ("Messrs. Bradbury's Juvenile Concerts" 1852). He organized conventions for aspiring music teachers, and his community choral concerts and music festivals each attracted hundreds of participants. As a composer and anthologist, he published thousands of works. …