The Oak
Florence Price (1887-1953)

THE STORY

Florence Price was born in Little Rock, Arkansas in 1887. At the age of 19, she graduated from the New England Conservatory with two diplomas, in piano and organ. She contemplated a career in medicine before firmly deciding to pursue music and devoting herself exclusively to composition and teaching. Price held teaching posts at universities and maintained a private studio in Chicago, where she spent the remainder of her life.

Extremely prolific, Price composed over 300 works and was the first black female composer to have a symphony performed by a major American orchestra: Frederick Stock and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra gave the world premiere of her Symphony No. 1 in E Minor on June 15, 1933, during Chicago’s Century of Progress Exposition.

The Oak (1943) is a symphonic poem which was never published nor performed during Price’s lifetime. The work embraces a modernist language that had begun to evolve in Price’s later works. Its opening measures communicate a sense of gravitas with sparse orchestration which is balanced by moments of warmth and light, leading to a climactic conclusion.

LISTEN FOR

• Dark, ominous moments of dissonance and chromaticism occasionally dispelled by radiant and ethereal episodes of harmonic clarity
• A gradual unfolding of the music leading to a stormy, almost martial climax in the minor key

INSTRUMENTATION

Piccolo, three flutes, two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, strings