Major N. Clark Smith in Chicago

Journal of the Illinois State Historical Society, Spring 2003 by Ohman, Marian M

With generous assistance from Patrick Healy, Smith studied at Chicago Musical College, which had been established by Dr. Florence Ziegfeld, a German emigrant, in 1867.9 Catalogs illustrating graduates and students from 1891 through 1905 depict only white faculty and students, primarily young females. School records could not confirm his attendance or degree awarded.10 Smith presumably studied as a private student, but the connections he established and maintained with faculty proved advantageous throughout his career. One of his teachers, Dr. Felix Borowski, the eminent Polish composer, theorist, and critic, who taught orchestration, composition, and history of music in the classroom, also offered private lessons for twenty dollars each.11 John B. Miller, tenor soloist with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, worked with Smith on voice training and the director of this symphony, Theodore Thomas, who had served as musical director for the Chicago Fair of 1893, also assisted Smith during the course of his career.12

Smith utilized his education and practical experiences in various community activities. Sometime during the first five years of the century he developed the Bethel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church choir, and in another project trained twelve women who formed the Ladies Mandolin Club. A photograph of this group illustrates Smith formally dressed, surrounded by women wearing long, elaborately ruffled skirts and white long-sleeved, high necked blouses, with decorative flowers adorning their hair. Their fingers are poised ready to pluck their instruments. He also receives credit for organizing the "Young Ladies Orchestra," as well as the first significant African-American symphony in Chicago.13

In 1903 J. Berni Barbour (b. 1881) and Smith established what some authorities contend was the first black owned music-publishing house.14 Their first collaboration was Baby, I'm Learning to Love You, written especially for the Sisters Meredity who, the Indianapolis Freeman reported, were making it a great hit.15 Although the Smith and Barbour enterprise was short-lived, both men found success in a wide range of musical activities and rose to national fame.16

After three years of work, study, and community involvement, Smith volunteered for a three-year enlistment in the Eighth Regiment Infantry, Illinois National Guard on 9 January 1904 and was appointed bandmaster.17 Other than the band's participation at a fair in Lexington, Kentucky, little has been uncovered about Smith's activities with the Guard, but while in service his participation in one outside event held in Chicago brought him in close contact with a highly respected international figure in the arena of classical music.

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor was born in England to an African father from Sierra Leone and an English mother, with whom he lived in Corydon, a suburb of London. While quite young, he established his reputation with highly respected compositions, such as Hiawatha's Wedding Feast (1898), and Death of Minnehaha (1899). Knowledgeable American musicians, especially choral directors and singers, revered his work.