Will Marion Cook: Exhortation, a Negro Sermon (video)

Soprano Marti Newland performs Exhortation, a Negro Sermon by Will Marion Cook 4/7/13 live in concert presented by MELODEON. She is accompanied by Artis Wodehouse, pianist. This video was filmed during the 3rd in a series of concerts presented by MELODEON at Church of the Epiphany, NYC during 2012-13. MELODEON performs American music from the 19th and early 20th century. Exhortation, a Negro Sermon was written by Will Marion Cook (1869-1944), one of the most important figures in pre-jazz African-American music. Born in Washington D.C. of free, educated Afro-American parents, Cook’s early musical promise was such that Frederick Douglass helped organize a fundraiser to send him to study in Europe. There he studied at the Berlin Hochschule für Musik with Joseph Joachim, the famous violinist and associate of Brahms. He later studied with Dvorak when that famous European composer visited the US. However, Cook of necessity turned to popular music as his classical career was not successful