The Harlem Renaissance was a burst of Black art, writing, and music in the 1920s and 1930s. Its center was Harlem, a neighborhood in New York City. Its musicians played jazz and blues in clubs and ballrooms, sang spirituals in concert halls, and wrote symphonies for orchestras. “Renaissance” means “rebirth.”
Quick facts
- When: from about 1918 to the middle of the 1930s
- Where: Harlem, in New York City, with close ties to Chicago and other cities
- The music: jazz, blues, spirituals, musical theater, and concert music
- Names to know: Duke Ellington, William Grant Still, Harry T. Burleigh, Marian Anderson, and Langston Hughes
How it began
In the early 1900s, hundreds of thousands of Black Americans left the South for cities in the North. They were looking for work and for safety. Historians call this the Great Migration.
Many of them settled in Harlem. By the 1920s, Black writers, painters, actors, and musicians lived and worked within a few blocks of each other. They shared ideas, and each art fed the others. Poets wrote in the rhythms of the blues, and composers set those poems to music.
Three kinds of music
Jazz and blues
Harlem’s clubs, theaters, and ballrooms were full of bands. Duke Ellington led his orchestra at the Cotton Club from 1927, and radio carried its sound across the country. At the Savoy Ballroom, dancers made up new steps to the bands of the day.
Harlem pianists played a style called stride. The left hand leaps between a low note and a chord, as it does in ragtime, and the right hand plays fast and free above it. Read the jazz band for kids.
Parents may want to know one hard fact. The Cotton Club hired Black performers and let in white customers alone. The Savoy Ballroom welcomed everyone.
Spirituals in the concert hall
Spirituals are the sacred songs first sung by enslaved Black Americans. Harry T. Burleigh arranged them for a solo voice and piano. Singers such as Roland Hayes, Marian Anderson, and Paul Robeson sang them in concert halls around the world.
Symphonies and concert music
Some composers set out to bring the blues, the spirituals, and Black dance rhythms into the symphony. William Grant Still worked in New York’s bands and theaters in the 1920s. In 1931, an orchestra in Rochester, New York, played his Afro-American Symphony.
The same wave reached Chicago. In 1933, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra played the Symphony in E minor by Florence Price.
People to know
| Name | Who they were | Read more |
|---|---|---|
| Duke Ellington | Bandleader, pianist, and composer, who lived from 1899 to 1974 | |
| William Grant Still | Composer of the Afro-American Symphony | Still for kids |
| Harry T. Burleigh | Singer and composer who arranged spirituals | Burleigh for kids |
| James P. Johnson | Stride pianist and composer | |
| Eubie Blake | Pianist and composer of the 1921 hit show Shuffle Along | |
| Marian Anderson | Singer with a deep, rich voice | |
| Florence Price | Composer in Chicago | Price for kids |
| Margaret Bonds | Composer and pianist, and a friend of Langston Hughes | Bonds for kids |
| Langston Hughes | Poet, whose words many composers set to music |
Eight pieces to hear
1. “Take the ‘A’ Train,” played by the Duke Ellington Orchestra. The band’s theme song from 1941, written by Billy Strayhorn. The A train is a subway line that runs to Harlem.
2. “Mood Indigo,” by Duke Ellington. A slow, dark-blue piece from 1930.
3. “Carolina Shout,” by James P. Johnson. Stride piano at full speed. Watch a video to see the left hand leap.
4. “Charleston,” by James P. Johnson. The tune behind one of the best-known dances of the 1920s.
5. “Deep River,” arranged by Harry T. Burleigh. A slow, wide spiritual for one voice and piano.
6. Afro-American Symphony, third movement, by William Grant Still. A bright, bouncing dance. Listen for the banjo strumming on the off-beats.
7. Symphony No. 1 in E minor, third movement, by Florence Price. A juba, a dance with stamping feet and patting hands.
8. “Juba,” by Nathaniel Dett. A piano piece from 1913, a few years before the Renaissance began. Read Dett for kids.
All eight are for instruments alone, or are spirituals. Many songs of the time have grown-up words, so listen first.
Marian Anderson at the Lincoln Memorial
In 1939, Marian Anderson was one of the most admired singers in the world. A concert hall in Washington refused to let her sing there because she was Black.
She sang outdoors on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. About 75,000 people came to hear her, and millions more listened on the radio. Her program ended with a spiritual arranged by Florence Price.
In 1955, she became the first Black singer to perform a leading role at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.
Things to do together
Find Harlem. Look at a map of New York City. Find Harlem, in the upper part of Manhattan, and trace the A train to it.
Stride. Pat a low “boom” on your left knee and a high “chick” on your left shoulder, over and over. Then clap a free rhythm with your right hand on the table.
Do the Charleston. Step forward and tap, step back and tap. Swing your arms the other way.
Name the color. Play “Mood Indigo.” Ask what color the music is. Then look up indigo.
Find the banjo. Play the third movement of Still’s symphony. Strum an air banjo each time you hear it.
Words with a beat. Read a short poem aloud while someone taps a slow, steady beat.
Questions to ask
- Why did so many artists gather in one neighborhood?
- How is a symphony with a banjo different from other symphonies?
- Why did it matter where Marian Anderson was allowed to sing?
- Which of the eight pieces would you play again?
Words to know
- Renaissance: a rebirth, or a time when the arts bloom
- Jazz: music with swing, off-beat rhythms, and made-up solos
- Blues: a kind of song, often sad, with its own bent notes and patterns
- Stride: a piano style with a leaping left hand
Print and play
Use a listening journal page for each piece. Read Black composers for kids, the Black History Month listening plan, and The Entertainer and Maple Leaf Rag for kids, for the ragtime that came first.
For more composers by era, see classical composers for kids.
More from this guide
This article is part of Classical composers for kids: a guide by era, from Vivaldi to Britten.
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Use it with your kids
Print a listening page, a practice chart, or a composer fact sheet. Or try a tool, such as the composer timeline or the piece picker.