By Maureen D. Lee
Sissieretta Jones, also known as the “Black Patti,” was one of the first African American women to sing at Carnegie Hall. She performed there four times between 1892 and 1896 and was one of the first black female vocalists to sing in the venue’s main auditorium, today called the Isaac Stern Auditorium, which seats almost 3,000 people.
The first two black women to perform at Carnegie Hall were soprano Tillie Jones Thomas and mezzo-soprano Deseria Plato. They sang during a concert that featured African American pianist W. T. Talbert and included pianist and baritone Henry T. Burleigh, also an African American. The performance on May 16, 1892, at 8:15 p.m. was held in the 300-seat Chamber Music Hall, known today as Weill Recital Hall.
Sissieretta’s first Carnegie Hall concert took place June 15, 1892, in the 1,200-seat Recital Hall (today called Zankel Hall) before a sold-out house. The concert, sponsored by the city’s black fraternal organization, the Society of the Sons of New York, was a benefit performance to raise money for the poor. A newspaper review from the New York Echo, said the hall was “jammed almost to suffocation” causing people to use the souvenir fans they had been given to cool themselves. Sissieretta appeared that night with other African American performers, including the well-known baritone Henry T Burleigh, soprano Jeannette Doyle, tenors J.W. Cochran and W.S. Durham, and bass singers J.H. Durham and Burr Edwards. Musicians included pianist Mrs. Albert Wilson and violinists Walter F. Craig and Martimus G. Knowles.
The audience loved the concert and applauded enthusiastically for all the performers, especially Sissieretta. Here is what the Echo’s review said:
“The Black Patti (and her name in not a misnomer) rendered the piece by Verdi called “Sempre Libera,” a piece well adapted for the occasion, and if Mme. Jones is not the equal of Adelina Patti, she at least can come nearer it than anything the American public has heard. Her notes are as clear as a mocking bird’s and her annunciation perfect . . . .”
During the second half of the program, Sissieretta sang, by request, what would become her signature song, “Way Down Upon a Swanee River” (Stephen Foster’s “Old Folks at Home”). The review said Sissieretta sang the song with great feeling.
Sissieretta’s next Carnegie Hall appearance came eight months later on February 13, 1893, this time in the Main Hall, when she sang at a benefit concert to raise money for the World’s Fair Colored Opera Company. Composer Will Marion Cook had been working for months to stage an all-black opera, Scenes from Uncle Tom’s Cabin, at the upcoming 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, better known as the World’s Columbian Exposition. He enlisted the help of Frederick Douglass, who suggested he hold benefit concerts to help raise money to purchase costumes, scenery, and other expenses and to assess people’s interest in the project. The first of these concerts was held at New York’s Carnegie Music Hall and featured Sissieretta, contralto Louise (Lulu) Hamer, tenor C. W. Payne, baritone Jeff Caldwell and the famous Fisk Jubilee Singers. Cook played the violin and Paul Bolen the piano. Douglass was to give a short opening address, but a reported “misunderstanding” kept him from appearing.
A winter storm on the night of the concert kept the concert hall from being filled, but many prominent members of society and patrons of the arts attended the successful concert. It was the first time African Americans had performed in the main auditorium at the Carnegie Music Hall. Sissieretta sang Pietro Centemeri’s “Grand Aria,” an aria from the opera L’Africaine by Giacomo Meyerbeer, and “Ave Maria,” accompanied by Cook on the violin and the Fisk Jubilee Singers.
Sissieretta’s next Carnegie Hall performance was a November, 18, 1894, concert in the Main Hall. It was her first appearance as the star of the Black Patti Concert Company, a company managed by a white man, Rudolph Voelckel, who was an associate of Morris Reno, president of the Carnegie Hall Music Association. The 8:15 p.m. concert program was entirely classical. Many in the audience were African American. Sissieretta was joined by several white, European musicians and vocalists such as the Vilona Sisters, an instrumental trio; contralto Mathilde Walter; tenor Vincenzo Bielletto; bass Orme Darvall; and pianist Orton Bradley. Sissieretta sang three numbers on the program: Gounod’s “Valse-Ariette,” an aria from Verdi’s La Traviata, and Gounod’s “Ave Maria,” which included a violin obbligato from Lilly Vilona. Sissieretta also sang several encores, including her signature song, “Swanee River.”
The final time Sissieretta performed at Carnegie Hall she was joined by two other famous African America vocalists — Marie Selika and Flora Batson Bergen. The October 12, 1896 concert in the main auditorium was advertised as the first time these three leading black concert singers had appeared in public together. The concert was the final event of a 12-day meeting of the Zion Grand Centennial Jubilee to mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Zion African Methodist Episcopal Church. New York Mayor William Strong presided at the concert, which was attended by the most fashionable African Americans in New York City, according to press reports. Although Mayor Strong had some awkward moments during his speech, the concert was a huge success. Booker T. Washington gave a speech on industrial education and there were several other speeches as well as musical performances. Soprano Marie Selika sang a selection from Verdi’s opera La Traviata; Flora Batson sang a waltz song by Arditi; and Sissieretta sang the cavatina from Gounod’s opera La Riene de Saba.
For more information about Sissieretta Jones at Carnegie Hall and for sources of the information presented in this blog, see: Sissierettta Jones, “The Greatest Singer of Her Race,” 1868-1933, by Maureen D. Lee (published by the University of South Carolina Press, May 2012)
Filed: June 12, 2012