Activities Among Negroes
Through the influence of Prof. Elmer Keeton the Publicity Club of the First A. M. E. Church of Oakland presented Clarence Cameron White, violin soloist, in recital Monday evening in the auditorium the church. He had a packed house, many having to be turned away. He has been rated by the musical critics of Europe and America as the foremost violin soloist of the negro race.
He was born in Clarksville, Tenn., but reared and educated in Oberlin, Ohio, having studied for five years in the Oberlin Conservatory of music, after which he taught in the public schools of Washington, D. C. In 1908 he went abroad and became a pupil in violin playing of M. Zacharewitsch, a noted Russian violinist. He also studied for three years musical composition under the late Coleridge Taylor of London. He is president of the National Association of Negro Musicians with a membership of nine hundred. He played on Monday night a most difficult program, part classical and negro spirituals. The West London (England) Times in speaking of White has said: "His playing is most finished, and artistic." The Musical American says: "His tone is beautiful, warm, velvety and joyous." The Chicago Defender said: "The highest compliment that can be paid White is that his phrasing is as fine as I have ever heard including the triumphant trio Heifetz, Kreisler and Ysaye."
The writer will add that while his phrasing and sustained tones of his fine delicacy of shading showed art, the key-note of it all was that he played with soul. His music held his audience as is in a trance. The rendition of the "Swan Song" by Saint Saen and a negro spiritual "On the Bayou" fully demonstrated the soul of his execution.
The writer in reading his article on "The Musical Genius of the American Negro" finds that while the article is historical and the first one to appear from the pen of a negro in a high class musical magazine the key-note of the article is the soul of the writer to the reading public, of the struggles of negro musicians in and efforts to acquire eminence after having been trained. He pleads with all the simplicity of greatness for an opportunity for trained negro musicians. He at the same time pleads for his own race to study music as a fine art.
The colored citizen of Oakland can be justly proud of the fact that White was accompanied by one their own number in the person of Prof. Elmer Keaton. The high-class program and the exactness of his accompanying gave the people an opportunity to judge of the musicianship of this teacher who is a graduate of the musical department of the Northwestern University. His playing was a credit to the institution, and also to his race.
The California Eagle of Los Angeles gives the following in an article headed "University of California notes by Lloyd C. Griffith": John Riddle of Pasadena is well-known as a University of Southern California varsity halfback, a baseball player and a successful sprinter. He has won monograms from the university in each of these eventful squads. And now he comes to us with an architectural prize showing that on April 21 he won the second place in the Palais D'Arts Architectural Drawing contest. This contest was open to the engineering students of the University of Southern California, and forty-five contestants submitted an exterior and interior drawing of what they suggest as an ideal library building. John Riddle is a member of Alpha Delta chapter of the Alpha Phi Alpha Greek letter Fraternity, a native son and also the son of the Rev. Riddle, who for years served as pastor of the Third Baptist church of San Francisco."
The Eagle also gives the following bit of news of interest to the reading public of this part of the state: "Mrs. Jane Williams Holmes under the pen name Jean Willa Holmes, has published a neat volume of poems entitled 'Lines, Lyrique.' Mrs. Holmes was for some time contributor to the Boston Chronicle, later becoming editor of the Poets' Corner in the Star of Zion, which position she still holds."
Mrs. Holmes was reared in Los Angeles, where her mother, Mrs. J. W. Williams, and her sister, Mrs. Bessie Dones, still live. She is also the wife of Rev. Holmes, a former pastor of Campbell street church in Oakland.
It also might be of interest to state that the "California Eagle" was founded some fourteen years ago by Miss Charlotte Spear, now Mrs. Bass. It was the outcome of a small sheet published by the late Mr. Neimore. Mrs. Bass has developed the paper until now it ranks as one of the largest papers published by colored people west of Denver. She has her own press, and has just recently added a literary department in which she will review books of value and encourage her race to aim high. Recently she won a contest in a public debate entitled "Resolved, that the Republican Party is the Best Party for the Negro and America."
The following recently appeared in the New York Age: "One hundred delegates attend the Y. W. C. A. convention at Hotel Commodore. More than one hundred delegates representing student and city Y. W. C. A. from as far west as Oakland, California, and as far south as Houston, Texas, attended. Miss Eva D. Bowles of the National Board is among those scheduled to address the three thousand delegates who are in attendance at the convention."
Among the number of society folks coming from San Jose to attend the White violin recital were: Miss Libby Boyler, Mr. and Mrs. Overton, Mr. and Mrs. McCall, Mr. and Mrs. Gentry and others.
The Sunday school department of St. Augustine Episcopal church will hold a display of arts and crafts during the coming week. This work is the result of members of the Sunday school, who in the public schools have been studying arts and crafts during the past year. The exhibit is for their encouragement and to stimulate an interest in others.
