In many ways, Dr. Samantha Ege’s work both honours and expands on the legacy of composer Florence Price. An African-American woman whose compositional voice “synthesised black musical idioms and classical conventions in pursuit of a distinctly American school of music,” as argued by Ege, Florence Price shattered convention alongside fellow Black women composers of the Black Chicago Renaissance including Margaret Bonds, Nora Holt, Maude Roberts George, and Betty Jackson King. Their compositional works form a cannon that has shaped the lives and careers of Black women in classical music during and beyond their lifetimes, Ege included. 

Ege’s award-winning scholarship and repertoire demonstrates her mastery of and authority in the works and life histories of these women, a path which Ege created for herself without compromising her artistic vision and integrity. Currently the Lord Crewe Junior Research Fellow in Music at the University of Oxford, Ege has built a career that centers the voices and works of Black women composers and women composers overall. At the time of this interview, Ege shares her journey, from her initial encounter with Florence Price to her hopes for her Barbican debut and beyond. 

Who are your favorite composers, past and present? Who are Black women and women of color composers that you’ve been listening to or playing lately? 

Florence Price is one of my favorite composers. For the music that she created and for the way that she opened a whole new dimension in my playing and my trajectory as a music historian and concert pianist. My beginning as an artist really starts with her and through learning about her, I have come to realize that Black people are everywhere in the history of classical music, past and present. In terms of contemporary composers, I really enjoy the music of Regina Harris Baiocchi as well as Jamaican-British composer Eleanor Alberga. I listen to a lot of contemporary music. So even though I don't necessarily play it, I think it's very important for me to recognize the dialogue between past and present and to not get too caught up in composers of the past that I'm not also looking out to the amazing Black women composers that we have today.

When were you first introduced to classical music and at what point in your journey, as a pianist and musicologist, did you decide that you were going to both honor and amplify the works of composers often overlooked and silenced by the classical canon? 

Classical music has always been a part of my life. I don't really remember a time when I wasn't playing the piano. But I took to it in a way that perhaps wasn't necessarily expected. I didn't spend my time as a child at music conservatoires or entering piano competitions and in my early pursuit of classical music, I accepted it as this European domain. It would be during my year abroad as an exchange student at McGill University in Canada, taking a course on 20th century music, when I was introduced to Florence Price. 

Being the ever-diligent student, I did all of the readings and listenings ahead of time. Everything up until that point had affirmed classical music as European and male. Florence Price really shattered the illusion that Black people were not a part of this space. It forced a greater sense of self-awareness because I had clearly been operating under the sense that I didn't belong in classical music, that there are no Black people in classical music. It was really a form of self-silencing and self-erasure. I learned about Price, and then learned about Margaret Bonds, who was a student of Price who composed beautiful music. 

Initially, I didn’t know what to do with the information because there was no blueprint, at the time, for how to pursue a career as a classical musician and historian amplifying Black women. I had been told by a professor at an institution that that kind of work wasn't marketable. But I revisited Price’s and Bonds’ music again and wanted to learn more about Black women composers of the past, which eventually became a PhD proposal. I really wanted to know how it was that Price was able to navigate Jim Crow America, how she managed to find her voice as a Black woman, the opposite of what an American composer was supposed to be. I wanted to know how she asserted her voice within her music. 

These questions inspired me and took me to Arkansas, where Price was born, and Chicago, where she found her network including women like Margaret Bonds and Nora Holt and Maude Roberts George and all of these brilliant Black women who were classically trained. And that's when I began to find my own network as well. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s African-American Network gave me the opportunity to present the work that I was doing at that time. I played Price's music and Bond’s music in the same space that they had 80 years earlier. And I feel that was a real turning point for me as an artist because I realized that I also have something to say as a pianist. From that point, my dual identity as a historian and performer was crystallized. 

Lessons from South African Women in Music

In February 2019, you shared on your blog that “Florence B. Price allowed me to see myself in the centre of a history I had spent my whole life learning about from the periphery.” How has Price’s entry into your life continued to transform your trajectory as a pianist, musicologist, and educator? 

Throughout my professional life, I have felt very much on the periphery. Spending time with Price’s music helped me find my space and my authority to confidently convey my work. Through my focus on Price’s work and life, I was able to address my own processes of silencing and minimizing and erasing myself from the narrative. Because of my slightly unconventional background, as a pianist who didn't enter all of the competitions and study in select conservatoires, it took me a while to recognize myself as a concert pianist who had absorbed the work of Price, Bonds, and other women into my repertoire. This is something that I have been passionate about for ages. Price's music helped me really claim my identity as a concert pianist. I am unlike others who go through certain routes and paths, and I'm very grateful for that because if not, I would not have encountered Price and Bonds and all of the magnificent composers who make my repertoire and my playing what it is.

How have composers Margaret Bonds, Nora Douglas Holt, and Betty Jackson King shaped both your artistry and your intellectual identity? 

I very much started with the Price narrative, because compared to other historical Black women composers, there is quite a bit on Price. I'm drawing upon quite a rich intellectual heritage but the more time I spent in Chicago, the more I came to understand Price as part of a network and as part of an era known as the Black Chicago Renaissance. That was an extremely important turning point for me because it pushed me to tell Price's story more expansively and to interweave different narratives to show that she's not an anomaly as a Black woman. And we are all the better for learning about that network, as opposed to just having this one Black woman composer as the pinnacle and the representative. The Black Chicago Renaissance is an era with its forerunners and pioneers. It has a distinct sound within classical music. If I play Price and Bonds, and include Betty Jackson King and Nora Holt, what listeners are then hearing is the broader history. It enables me to be even more versatile, as a storyteller in both my programming choices and as a historian. 

VanJess on Heritage and Home

When did you decide that you were going to record Fantasie Nègre: The Piano Music Of Florence Price? What motivated you? 

With my first album, Four Women, I'd given a recital of music by women composers and thought of recording the music for myself so that I would have a memory of this concept. I recorded these pieces just to put up on my YouTube channel and that led to a record deal with Wave Theory Records. They invited me to do a full album, which featured Price, Bonds, Vítezslava Kaprálová, and Ethel Bilsland. There were so many personal connections on that recording. And because of my research at the time, the Price piece I played was her “Sonata in E Minor.” I decided the second album was going to present Price as a virtuoso. I want listeners to get to know her personality through this album. The second album was an amazing mix of my work as a historian going through the archives and piecing together works that appear to be incomplete. And then me as a pianist saying, “Okay, now to convince the listener of what Price has to say with this music.'' Music that, for the most part, hadn't been recorded yet. 

What have you enjoyed most throughout your journey with Price’s work, from the album’s recording and release to your upcoming show at the Barbican to your upcoming books on Price’s work and legacy? 

Every now and then, there are moments where I just can't believe where I am as a result of Price. Whether it's playing at the Chicago Cultural Center in 2019, a space that she used to come to in the 1930s and 1940s realizing, “Oh my goodness, I'm here,” or this position that I have at the University of Oxford as the Lord Crewe Junior Research Fellow in Music, a topic that “wasn't marketable” has brought me here. The fact that I will be playing at the Barbican considering my unconventional route, and yet her music has brought me to one of the most prestigious venues in the UK. I have to remind myself to stop and enjoy the view because it's quite incredible that at no point have I had to compromise on my vision for the work that I'm doing. It is work that I would be doing regardless of the current mainstream focus on Price. This is a very personal journey for me. And the most exciting thing has just been the adventure of it all. 

What do you look forward to, in terms of future research and performance projects and goals? 

I'm looking forward to writing my books. I'm so excited about the collaborative aspects of them because the Cambridge companion of Florence Price is a co-edited volume with my friend and colleague Curry Hill and the biography for Oxford University Press is a co-authored volume with my friend and colleague Douglas Shadle. I’m also writing a book about Price’s Chicago network. It is the culmination of all of the support that I have received throughout my journey with my networks in the United States and incredible mentorship that I've had here in the UK and around the world. I’m very excited to be at the Barbican stage, where I’ll be able to express everything that I've learned and everything that I've been researching through this book as a performer. There is also a new album on the way. It is a very collaborative project in which I’m bringing together the voices of different musicians and musicologists who are interested in and focusing on historical Black women composers. 

In terms of future projects, I’m so excited to see where I can go as a pianist. I don't know what a career as a concert pianist who doesn't play Beethoven looks like and I am so excited to just find out. I have worked through the perceived limitations of not having had a conventional background and have gotten to the point where I truly realize how freeing it is to just say, “Actually, I want to play this. I want to play this music by this composer, and I'm just going to do it.” I don't need to justify it. It starts with my own fulfillment as an artist and because that then feeds into my practice, it makes for a great experience for the audience too. I'm going to see what happens and keep pushing forward with this path, because I have a good feeling about it. 

Do you have any last thoughts to offer?

There is always a precedent for Black women's work across so many areas. While it can be daunting to push forward with the visions that we have, it's incredible the way that we find that we're actually not alone. It’s a case of getting over that first hurdle and claiming our visibility or auditability. Keep pushing and I believe that you'll find yourself in an amazing company.

*This interview has been edited for length and clarity.