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This talented musician continually felt the weight of her parent’s reputation. Being the child of Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, among the prominent English composers of the turn of the 20th century, Avril’s name was enveloped in the lingering obscurity of history.

The First Recording

Not long ago, I contemplated these memories as I made arrangements to record the first-ever recording of the composer’s concerto for piano composed in 1936. Boasting impassioned harmonies, expressive melodies, and confident beats, Avril’s work will provide audiences fascinating insight into how she – a composer during war born in 1903 – imagined her reality as a female composer of color.

Past and Present

However about the past. One needs patience to adjust, to perceive forms as they actually appear, to tell reality from misrepresentation, and I was reluctant to face the composer’s background for a while.

I deeply hoped her to be following in her father’s footsteps. To some extent, that held. The idyllic English tones of Samuel’s influence can be observed in several pieces, for example From the Hills (1934) and Sussex Landscape (1940). But you only have to examine the names of her father’s compositions to see how he identified as not just a standard-bearer of UK romantic tradition but a advocate of the African heritage.

This was where father and daughter began to differ.

The United States evaluated Samuel by the brilliance of his art instead of the colour of his skin.

Parental Heritage

During his studies at the renowned institution, her father – the child of a parent from Sierra Leone and a British mother – started to lean into his African roots. Once the African American poet the renowned Dunbar came to London in 1897, the young musician was keen to meet him. He adapted Dunbar’s African Romances into music and the subsequent year used the poet’s words for a musical work, Dream Lovers. Then came the choral work that made him famous: Hiawatha’s Wedding Feast.

Based on this American writer’s The Song of Hiawatha, this composition was an international hit, especially with Black Americans who felt vicarious pride as the majority judged Samuel by the excellence of his music rather than the colour of his skin.

Activism and Politics

Recognition did not temper his activism. During that period, he participated in the First Pan African Conference in London where he met the prominent scholar this influential figure and observed a range of talks, including on the oppression of African people in South Africa. He was a campaigner until the end. He maintained ties with early civil rights leaders including Du Bois and Booker T Washington, delivered his own speeches on racial equality, and even talked about issues of racism with the American leader on a trip to the US capital in 1904. Regarding his compositions, reminisced Du Bois, “he wrote his name so high as a creative artist that it will endure.” He succumbed in 1912, at 37 years old. Yet how might the composer have made of his offspring’s move to travel to South Africa in the 1950s?

Conflict and Policy

“Daughter of Famous Composer shows support to S African Bias,” appeared as a heading in the Black American publication Jet magazine. Apartheid “appeared to me the right policy”, the composer stated Jet. When pushed to clarify, she revised her statement: she did not support with apartheid “as a concept” and it “should be allowed to work itself out, overseen by good-intentioned people of every background”. Had Avril been more aligned to her parent’s beliefs, or raised in the US under segregation, she could have hesitated about apartheid. However, existence had shielded her.

Background and Inexperience

“I hold a British passport,” she stated, “and the authorities never asked me about my background.” Thus, with her “light” appearance (as Jet put it), she floated within European circles, supported by their admiration for her renowned family member. She gave a talk about her parent’s compositions at the Cape Town university and conducted the broadcasting ensemble in the city, programming the bold final section of her Piano Concerto, titled: “In remembrance of my Father.” While a confident pianist herself, she avoided playing as the soloist in her concerto. Rather, she always led as the maestro; and so the apartheid orchestra performed under her direction.

The composer aspired, in her own words, she “could introduce a change”. Yet in the mid-1950s, things fell apart. Once officials became aware of her mixed background, she had to depart the nation. Her British passport failed to safeguard her, the UK representative urged her to go or face arrest. She came home, embarrassed as the scale of her innocence dawned. “This experience was a hard one,” she expressed. Compounding her disgrace was the release in 1955 of her ill-fated Jet interview, a year after her unceremonious exit from South Africa.

A Common Narrative

Upon contemplating with these legacies, I perceived a familiar story. The narrative of holding UK citizenship until it’s challenged – one that calls to mind African-descended soldiers who fought on behalf of the UK in the global conflict and survived only to be refused rightful benefits. And the Windrush generation,