FORT COLLINS, Colo. — The Fort Collins Symphony (FCS) will perform the Colorado premiere of Florence Price’s Ethiopia’s Shadow in America at its “Dvořák Discovery” concert at 7:30 p.m. MST on Saturday, February 3, 2024, in-person at the Lincoln Center and via live-stream. In a unique collaboration with artist Louise Cutler, the concert will also feature the unveiling of a new painting inspired by the music.
As a black woman living in Jim Crow America, Florence Price faced prejudice and challenges because of both her gender and the color of her skin. She wrote Ethiopia’s Shadow in America in 1932, just as she was starting to be recognized as a musical talent in America. But after her death in 1953, much of her work was lost and forgotten. It wasn’t until 2009 that a collection of her unpublished manuscripts was discovered in her former home near St. Anne, Illinois. Ethiopia’s Shadow in America was given its first performance in 2015, 83 years after its composition.
Ethiopia’s Shadow in America traces the physical and emotional journeys of those who were enslaved against their will and brought to the United States, from their first arrival to their forced acquiescence of a new life. Its three sections are titled: 1. “The Arrival of the Negro in America when first brought here as a slave,” 2. “His Resignation and Faith,” and 3. “His Adaptation, a fusion of his native and acquired impulses.”
In the world of “firsts”, Price was the first black woman in the U.S. to have a composition played by a major orchestra. This performance will also be the Colorado premiere of Ethiopia’s Shadow in America, 92 years after its composition.
“What I love most about Ethiopia’s Shadow in America,” Cutler says, “is that even in seemingly joyous moments you still get a sense of melancholy undertones and sadness, conveying a message beyond the message within the piece and beautifully capturing the resilience, determination, and strength of the people it is about.”
Louise Cutler’s artwork has been featured in Art Business News, Art World News, Edge of Faith, and Beyond Words Magazine. She was selected as one of Art Business News magazines’ “Top Emerging Artists,” and her painting “Alone” was recently exhibited at the Royal Academy of Arts in London’s 2021 Summer Exhibition. Her work “Black Creativity” has been exhibited in The Museum of Science and Industry, The DuSable Museum of African American History, Museum of Art in Fort Collins, Sculpture in The Park, Stola Contemporary Art Gallery in Chicago, and the Arvada Art Center Gallery, among others.
“I had planned to use acrylic for this painting,” said Cutler about her process in creating the 36” by 36” oil on canvas work, “but after listening to the piece and learning Florence Price’s journey, I found it too cold for such a passionate musical composition. For this painting I had to use oils. Oil paint to me is very a warm and passionate medium and represents the emotion Florence felt when she created music, if she had been a painter.”
Cutler’s painting will be on auction in February and throughout March to bring awareness to Black History Month and Women’s History Month, and to raise funds for the symphony’s Open Notes program. This program provides free tickets and educational programs to underserved populations in Fort Collins.
The “Dvořák Discovery” concert will also feature Antonín Dvořák’s Violin Concerto, performed by Colorado Symphony Concertmaster Yumi Hwang-Williams, and his Symphony No. 9, “From the New World.” Dvořák wrote this symphony after moving to America and hearing traditional Native American and African American music. It has since become one of the most influential symphonies ever written, providing the melody for the spiritual “Going Home” and inspiring John William’s score for Jaws.
To learn more about the painting or participate in the auction, please visit the Symphony’s website at FCSymphony.org/Painting.
To learn more about the concert and find tickets, please visit FCSymphony.org/Discovery.
Signature Concert 3 sponsors: Trois Coeurs Foundation, Kenneth & Myra Monfort Charitable Foundation, and Plante Moran.
FCS Season sponsors: Arts Without End, City of Fort Collins Fort Fund, Colorado Creative Industries, David & Alison Dennis, Lyric Cinema, National Endowment for the Arts, Dr. Ed Siegel, and Dr. Peter Springberg.
For More Information, please contact Jeremy D. Cuebas, Marketing and Communications Director, at 970.482.4823 or via email at [email protected].