Rudolph Dunbar: 'A fascinating person, composer, musical conductor, musical journalist, and Caribbean pioneer of the classics' -Alex Pascal (June 16, 1988)
Celebrating our creative personalities
By Dr. Vibert C. Cambridge
Stabroek News
August 22, 2004
Rudolph Dunbar was born in Agricola, East Bank Demerara, circa 1902 and died in London in June 1988.
He performed, composed, and conducted classical music in New York, Paris, Berlin, and London.
Dunbar grew up in Georgetown, near to the place where the British Guiana Militia Band rehearsed. He was impressed and influenced by the music of Wagner and Elgar. From an early age, he wanted a musical career; specifically, he wanted to be a concert pianist. His mother encouraged him by taking him to visit a German pianist who was living in Georgetown.
His father did not consider music to be a worthwhile career for a dark-skinned male in race and colour-conscious colonial British Guiana. He said it would make him a "no good." Dunbar's father wanted him to become a barrister; however, he decided that if Dunbar was going to become a musician, he would have to be the best. Excellence was the only route to success in colonial British Guiana.
The family's economic plight resulted in Dunbar joining the British Guiana Militia Band as an apprentice at the age of 14. He became a clarinettist. In a 1988 interview with Alex Pascal, Dunbar reported that he did not enjoy his stay with the band. He felt that the regimentation was counter-productive and sometimes abusive. He did conclude, however, that the discipline acquired there benefited him for the rest of his life.
After five years, he left the band for the United States to study music at the Institute of Musical Arts, New York (now known as The Julliard School). There Dunbar studied composition, clarinet, piano, and other musical subjects, and was recognized for being a talented clarinettist. He graduated after five years.
While in the United States, Dunbar developed a long-lasting relationship with the African-American composer, William Grant Still. His correspondence with Still can be found within the William Grant Still and Verna Avery Papers at the University of Arkansas.
Dunbar also experimented with jazz, and in the mid-1920s was a clarinet soloist in recordings by The Plantation Orchestra.
In 1925, he travelled to Paris for post-graduate studies in music. His professors were among the best in France. He described his clarinet teacher as one of the best in the world at that time. Dunbar was determined to reach great heights, in the process, he made the clarinet a concert instrument. His fame spread.
As a result of his work with the clarinet, Madame Debussy (wife of the composer Claude Debussy) invited him to give a private recital in her apartment in 1930. This was a great honour. She invited some of the members and faculty of the Conservatoire. By 1931, Dunbar's reputation as a gifted clarinettist was unassailable. His style and technique were lauded.
A Musical Courier review of a concert at the Salle Chopin (Plepal) stated, "Rudolph Dunbar, Negro clarinettist, gave an unusually beautiful programme." The review continued, "It is seldom one sees such rapt attention by a large audience as Mr Dunbar received. His virtuosity, purity of tone and well-round ability have placed him in the front rank of artists abroad."
Similar sentiments were expressed by Excelsior, Comedia, and Revue International De Musique. "A clarinet recital is in itself a rarity. But an eclectic and tastefully arranged programme, such as Mr Dunbar played is also uncommon, declared French pianist and music critic Maurice Dumesnil. "He went from Mozart to Debussy, through Weber and Chopin, all played with fine qualities, a rich, fluent mechanism, and excellent appreciation for the different styles of the composers. He was recalled many times."
In 1931, Dunbar moved to London, where he established a school for clarinettists. It was the only such school in the world at that time. He had students from South Africa, India, and countries in Europe.
He was commissioned to write a textbook on the clarinet. The book, Treatise on the Clarinet (Boehm System), is now a collector's item. Recognizing that he might not always be able to perform as a clarinettist, Dunbar branched into conducting, which he had studied in New York and Paris.
He conducted several of Britain's leading orchestras. Pearl Connor-Mogosti recalls him conducting the London Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall. "[It] was the first for a black Caribbean man and we were all thrilled by his success," said Connor-Mogosti.
Dunbar also conducted the London Philharmonic Orchestra when Lenora Mila I Romeu recorded Noches en los jardines Espana. He would conduct other symphony orchestras including the BBC Symphony, the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Orchestra du Conservatoire.
After a stint as a war correspondent during World War II, Dunbar returned to conducting and became the first conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra after World War II. According to Dunbar, that act was one of the final nails in the coffin of Hitler's anti-Negro propaganda. He also felt that it was also an act that brought significant pride to peoples of African descent globally.
On June 12, 1945, Dunbar conducted The Orchestra du Conservatoire and Jenne Marie Darre for the premiere of William Grant Still's In Memoriam and The African American Symphony at the Theatre des Champs Elysees. The performance was a benefit to raise funds for the anti-colonial struggle.
Dunbar described his composition style as "ultra modern." An example is Dance of the 21st Century, composed for the Footlights Dramatic Club, Cambridge University. He conducted its American premier during the late 1940s when it was broadcast coast-to-coast by the National Broadcasting Company (NBC). This launched his conducting career in the United States.
In addition to performing classical music, Dunbar also played jazz. Between 1931 and 1934, he led two orchestras in the United Kingdom: the All British Coloured Band, aka Rumba Coloured Orchestra, and Rudolph Dunbar and his African Polyphony. These bands played important roles in the growth of the recording industry and the recording of West Indian music in the United Kingdom.
Dunbar was part of a pioneering group of West Indians in the United Kingdom. This group had to fight the scourge of racism. They did it with dignity, despite experiencing great pain. The group included CLR James, David Pitt (later Lord Pitt), George Padmore, Cy Grant, Winifred Atwell, Eric Connor, and Ken 'Snakehips' Johnson.
In an interview with Alex Pascal in 1988, about six months before his death, Dunbar spoke about the particular vindictiveness of a producer/director of music at the BBC who derailed his musical career in Europe. Dunbar described that director of music as "despicable and vile" and the BBC "as stubborn as mules and ruthless as rattlesnakes."
He returned to British Guiana in the mid-1950s for a tour. Among his engagements were conducting the BG Militia Band, the BG Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Christ Church Diocesan Youth Movement Choir. Dunbar also organized several concerts, including the All-Star Concert held on September 16, 1951, to support the Jamaican Hurricane Relief Fund.
When Dunbar died, he was writing his memoirs. This project is being completed by his nephew Ian Hall, another important Guyanese musician in the United Kingdom. Ian Hall has described his uncle as an extraordinary man who was an excellent conductor and was magical on the podium. Said Hall, "He was a good orator, generous, ambitious and a champion for black achievement."
Lord Pitt of Hampstead has called Dunbar one of England's distinguished citizens. Said Pitt, "He was a pioneer. But like all pioneers he fell victim to the prejudices that invariably exist against him. His musical genius was well-known in the Caribbean. He was a man who had a dream. He had a vision, and to his credit, he kept that dream and vision to the end, in spite of all of the obstacles that were in his way."
Dunbar's memory is kept alive in the United Kingdom through The Lord Pitt Foundation and the Bloomsbury Society (UK) Rudolph Dunbar Award. The BBC produced a documentary on him for the series Eye to Eye and broadcast it in 1989.
Dunbar demonstrated that Guyanese have the tenacity and skills to overcome adversity to leave a positive mark on humanity.
Sources
Thanks to the UK-based music historian Richard Noblett for making available materials on Rudolph Dunbar.