Artist page

William Grant Still (May 11, 1895 – December 3, 1978) was an influential African-American composer known for his contributions to classical and film music. Born in Woodville, Mississippi, he grew up in Little Rock, Arkansas, where he began studying the violin in high school. After graduating as valedictorian in 1911, he attended Wilberforce University but left in 1915 to pursue music at a conservatory. In 1916, Still briefly worked in Memphis before an inheritance allowed him to study at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, where he received free composition lessons due to his financial struggles. He served in the Navy for nearly nine months in 1918 and then worked in a New Jersey shipyard before returning to Ohio to play the violin professionally. Still moved back to New York, where he worked as an arranger and served as musical director for the first black-owned record label from 1921 to 1923. He played the oboe in the pit orchestra for the all-black musical "Shuffle Along." During the early 1930s, he arranged popular music for radio shows and wrote jazz pieces for notable artists. His classical music career took off with the performance of his "Symphony No. 1 'Afro-American'" by the Rochester Philharmonic in 1931. He received three Guggenheim Fellowships for composition and moved to Los Angeles to work on his first opera, "Blue Steel." In

For any edit requests, please reach out to info@rovr.live