African-American composer Zenobia Powell Perry -- apparently no relation to the younger composer Julia Perry -- came from an interesting confluence of influences; born in Oklahoma, Perry's mother was a Creek Indian and her grandfather was a black Creek Indian who had been a slave of the Creek Indians. She studied composition with R. Nathaniel Dett, Darius Milhaud, and composer Allen Willman of the University of Wyoming. Perry's extant output begins in the mid-'50s and runs to about 1990; she died in 2004 at the age of 95, ...
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African-American composer Zenobia Powell Perry -- apparently no relation to the younger composer Julia Perry -- came from an interesting confluence of influences; born in Oklahoma, Perry's mother was a Creek Indian and her grandfather was a black Creek Indian who had been a slave of the Creek Indians. She studied composition with R. Nathaniel Dett, Darius Milhaud, and composer Allen Willman of the University of Wyoming. Perry's extant output begins in the mid-'50s and runs to about 1990; she died in 2004 at the age of 95, and most of her works date from the 1960s and '70s. Perry did write orchestral music and at least one opera, Tawawa House, in 1987, but the Cambria Music disc Music of Zenobia Powell Perry concentrates on works created in smaller dimensions: art songs and song cycles, a clarinet sonata, and several works for piano. This disc was originally issued in 2002 on the Jaygale Music label and sold at concert tours, mostly given in and around the state of Ohio in the last years of her life....
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