Samual Coleridge-Taylor is a very interesting composer. 

He was born on 15 August 1875. Of mixed race birth, Coleridge-Taylor achieved such success that he was referred to by white New York musicians as the “African Mahler” when he had three tours of the United States in the early 1900s. He was particularly known for his three cantatas on the epic poem, Song of Hiawatha by American Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Coleridge-Taylor premiered the first section in 1898, when he was 22. 

He married an Englishwoman, Jessie Walmisley, and both their children had musical careers. Their son Hiawatha adapted his father’s music for a variety of performances and their daughter Avril Coleridge-Taylor became a composer-conductor.

By 1896, Coleridge-Taylor was already earning a reputation as a composer. He was later helped by Edward Elgar, who recommended him to the Three Choirs Festival. His “Ballade in A minor” was premiered there and his early work was also guided by the influential music editor and critic August Jaeger of music publisher Novello. It was he who told Elgar that Taylor was “a genius”.

Composers were not handsomely paid for their music, and they often sold the rights to works outright in order to make immediate income. This caused them to lose the royalties earned by the publishers who had invested in the music distribution through publication. The popular Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast sold hundreds of thousands of copies, but Coleridge-Taylor had sold the music outright for the sum of 15 guineas, so did not benefit directly. 

Coleridge-Taylor was 37 when he died of pneumonia on 1 September 1912. His death is often attributed to the stress of his financial situation. He was buried in Bandon Hill Cemetery, Wallington, Surrey which is today in the London Borough of Sutton.

After Coleridge-Taylor’s death, musicians were concerned that he and his family had received no royalties from his Song of Hiawatha, which was one of the most successful and popular works written in the previous 50 years. His case contributed to the formation of the Performing Rights Society, an effort to gain revenues for musicians through performance as well as publication and distribution of music.

King George V granted Jessie Coleridge-Taylor, the young widow, an annual pension of £100, evidence of the high regard in which the composer was held and in 1912 a memorial concert was held at the Royal Albert Hall which garnered £300 for the composer’s family.

I am very fond of Coleridge-Taylor’s music especially his Violin Concerto in G minor, Op. 80 written in the year he died. His Nonet in F minor, Piano Trio in E Minor and Piano Quintet in G Minor are also worth investigating.

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Violin Concerto in G minor, Op.80

I. Allegro maestoso-Vivace-Allegro molto

II. Andante semplice. Andantino

III. Allegro molto-Moderato

Lorraine McAslan – Violin

London Philharmonic Orchestra

Nicholas Braithwaite – Conductor

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor: Nonet, Piano Trio & Piano Quintet

Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective