Celebrating a Century of George Walker

Today is the centenary celebration of the birth of George Walker, American composer, pianist, and organist. Recipient of two Guggenheim Fellowships and an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award, Walker was the first African American to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music.

When he passed away in the summer of 2018, I recalled how I’d been meaning to program his stunningly beautiful Lyric for Strings for years, and just had not quite ever gotten around to it. I immediately set about correcting this, and programmed it for the following Panoramic Voices season. Unsurprisingly, I enjoyed every minute of digging into the score, both in 2019 (I’ll share that performance video here) and for when I had the privilege of relearning the work when it was programmed at the 2021 Victoria Bach Festival.

The world may have lost George Walker, but his art lives on forever. Happy heavenly birthday, dear sir, and thank you for the music.