Cheesy Grits: Excursus: David Mannes and the Music School Settlement for Colored People (Part 1 of 2)

We know of David Mannes today mainly through his New York City namesake, the Mannes School of Music, which is now affiliated with the New School. Mannes himself was born in New York City in 1866 to Polish immigrant parents. He began violin lessons at an early age and joined the New York Symphony in 1891. He became concertmaster of the New York Symphony in 1898.

Because Mannes was himself the child of immigrants, he never lost sight of the plight of those who had arrived here in the U.S. with little or nothing and who worked in sweatshops so that their children might have better. He decided to cut back on touring so that he could devote more time to providing music lessons for these immigrant children. After a time of involvement with the University Settlement music school, he purchased two houses on E. Third Street on Manhattan's Lower East Side and formed the beginnings of the Third Street Music School Settlement, as a branch of the Henry Street Settlement. His Third Street School is still in operation today.


But David Mannes felt a special debt to one person from his past and the establishment of the Music School Settlement for Colored People, first in San Juan Hill and then in Harlem, was a partial payment on that debt. That person was an African American violinist and composer, John Thomas Douglas.

The date of Douglas's birth is given as 1846. His mother is described as having been enslaved, so if he was born while she was enslaved, then he was himself born into enslavement. Nevertheless, the accounts hold that, at some point, he and his mother made their way to Philadelphia, where the young boy's musical abilities became apparent. Backed by some unidentified patrons, he was sent off to Europe to study the violin. When he returned, he was unable to find a placement in an orchestra because of the color of his skin, so he had to turn to the life of a more-or-less itinerant guitar and banjo picker to provide for himself. David Mannes' autobiography picks the story up there:

"One morning when I was practicing in the basement of our house, the doorbell jangled in our areaway. Mother opened the door to a rather fine-looking Negro, well-dressed, short and stout, wearing a moustache and goatee à la Napoleon III. He asked my mother, most deferentially, who was playing the violin. Mother answered, 'My son.' Noticing my mother's broken English, he then proceeded to speak in good and fluent German, saying that his name was John Douglas, and that he was a violinist. Could he see me? He was shown in and asked me to play for him. After that, he played for me on my small violin with such ability that I was amazed at his performance."

"We became good friends and he taught me many important things in violin playing. He was a dear, gentle companion in many a walk and talk. Born of a slave mother, who, after the war, left the South for Philadelphia, he had from childhood shown a considerable musical talent and very early had received some instruction. Some white people, evidently his mother's employers, became much interested in the boy and finally sent him abroad to study with Rapoldi in Dresden. Rapoldi was the most famous pupil of Spohr and became devoted to his young Negro pupil; the boy's master, as evidence of his regard, gave him a chin rest, modeled and carved by Spohr, which in turn Douglas offered to me. It was cut out of a solid block of rosewood made to fit over the tailpiece. It seemed too precious a thing for me to receive, and I declined the gift. I remember Douglas' disappointment at my refusal. I am very sorry that I did not take it; it was offered so spontaneously."

"After studying with Rapoldi for some years, Douglas went to Paris to study the French school of violin playing. In both countries, he worked steadily at composition, playing the piano and later on the violoncello. He learned to speak French easily, but in America had no occasion to use any foreign tongue. With my father and mother, he spoke German. He composed much music, of which the piles of manuscript in his home were ample evidence. He occasionally played at entertainments given by people of his race, but outside of his friends few knew of his existence. He tried to enter a symphony orchestra in this country, but those doors were closed to a colored man. Being of a modest and retiring nature he was not able to insist on being heard. Douglas was like a fish out of water, ahead of his time by thirty or forty years. He grew despondent and later on began to drink. I believe I was his only pupil but there never was a question of payment for such service as he rendered me. I recall so vividly my playing Mazas, Pleyel and Viotti duets with him, for two violins, violin and viola, and cello and violin. In this way I learnt to read at sight and to play with better rhythmic values."

"In order to augment his meager income he learnt to play the guitar and played it remarkably. I remember his performance of his own arrangement for the guitar of the Tannhaüser March, and other excerpts of this opera which had been played in New York for the first time only a few years before. Like Paganini, he adored the guitar and dived deep into its technical possibilities. I was always aware of his artistic and intellectual superiority, and envied him his musical erudition; an envy which awakened the desire in me for further knowledge."

"Now do you realize how much John Douglas meant to me?"

 And it was to honor the memory of John Douglas that David Mannes launched the Music School Settlement for Colored People, first located at the Lincoln House and then at 4-6 W. 131st St.


Notes:

1) The customs of the times meant that the Mannes School of Music bore only David's family name; his wife, Clara Damrosch Mannes, was his partner both in music-making and philanthropy.

2) The details of John Douglas's life are proving difficult to corroborate, e.g., several secondary sources use the year cited above for his birth but none indicate a primary source; similarly, the date of his death is listed as 1886 with no primary source indicated. One wonders, too, whether his name survives in any of the literature surrounding the violin teacher, Rapoldi, who apparently taught in Dresden.

To further confuse the issue, the Wikipedia article about Douglas spells his last name "Douglass." There is the possibility that there is a bit of confusion here between John Douglas and violinist Joseph Douglass, the grandson of Frederick Douglass, although Joseph is much younger than John. (Joseph Douglass would himself go on to become an instructor at the Music School Settlement.)

3) The quoted excerpt is from David Mannes' autobiography, Music is my Faith: an Autobiography. (W.W. Norton: 1938). pp 37-40. That said, the New York Times reported on 9 Mar 1912 on a presentation given by Mannes at a conference on the evils of pauperism in which Mannes identifies his African American mentor as "Charles" rather than "John." Otherwise, the general outlines of the account of their first meeting and of Douglas's subsequent influence on Mannes are similar.

4) A piano score of one of Douglas's compositions, an overture entitled The Pilgrim, may be found here. Douglas is also identified as the first African American opera composer, having written a three act work entitled Virginia's Ball, which received its premiere in New York in 1868. No copies of the score are known to survive.