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2013-2014 BROWN BAG COLLOQUIUM SERIES
Brazeal Dennard: Cultural
Impact of Spirituals
Eldonna May
Lecturer
Music
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2014
11:45 AM - 12:45PM
SCHAVER MUSIC RECITAL HALL/1321 OLD MAIN
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
Brazeal Dennard (1929-2010), who worked tirelessly to promote and preserve
the works of African-American musicians through coalition building and social
entrepreneurship in the arts, left behind a rich musical legacy in Detroit
including the founding of the Brazeal Dennard Chorale in 1972, and the cofounding of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra’s Classical Roots concert series in
1978. Both entities are steeped in the traditions of African-American music and
evidenced most notably in the spiritual. When speaking of spirituals Dennard
remarked, "I am two generations removed from slavery." In an interview
published in The Detroit Free Press in 1997 he stated, "I grew up listening to the
music that expressed our hopes and soothed our sorrows. It became a part of
me. So in a sense [it] is the link to our past."
Dennard’s activities also perpetuated the Harlem Renaissance ideal by
promoting the music of African-American composers and fostering the heritage
of the Negro spiritual. In addition to serving as a series editor for Alliance Music
Publishers, Inc., Dennard’s own compositions and arrangements of spirituals
further preserved this rich legacy. Through his work as a music educator,
composer and arranger, choral conductor and founder of the Brazeal Dennard
Chorale, he fostered the genre of the spiritual, along with works by
contemporary black composers and masterpieces by Bach, Beethoven, Brahms
and others. Dennard built The Brazeal Dennard Chorale into a nationally
recognized choir admired for its professionalism and wide repertoire.
One of his greatest achievements was the preservation of spirituals, the religious
folk songs of African-American slaves, which he championed through
performances, recordings, workshops, guest conducting, published
arrangements, articles, historical research and the dialogue he maintained for
decades with choral directors and singers throughout the country. This project
explores the musical significance, contribution to diversity in Christian
traditions, and cultural impact of the spiritual through critical and rhetorical
analysis of selected musical works by Brazeal Dennard, including: Hush,
Somebody’s Calling My Name, Lord, I Want To Be A Christian, and Fare Ye Well.
A gifted pedagogue, Eldonna L. May, certified online professor, is a faculty member of the music department at Wayne State University where she lectures in music history. Dr. May has authored 15
articles for The New Grove Dictionary of Music, 2 ed., and Grove Music Online. Her forthcoming book
entitled, Brazeal Dennard: Songs Worth Singing. A Biography is scheduled for publication by Scarecrow
Press in 2014. She also has contributed 22 articles to the two-volume encyclopedia Music in the Social
and Behavorial Sciences, published by Golson Media in 2014, and 21 articles for ABC-CLIO’s Music
around the world: a global encyclopedia (forthcoming in 2014). In October 2012 Dr. May negotiated a
Memorandum of Understanding with Botho University (Botswana) for a strategic international academic partnership with Wayne State University. She negotiated the installation of the Brazeal W. Dennard Memorial Archive at Wayne State University.
For More Information about the Humanities Center, call (313) 577-5471 Or visit our website at www.research.wayne.edu/hum Or add “WayneState HumanitiesCenter” on
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