Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson (1932-2004), named for the black Romantic-era composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, had wide-ranging musical interests. He composed classical works, but also worked as a jazz pianist and wrote film scores as well as pop arrangements for the likes of Marvin Gaye and Harry Belafonte. His classical concert music fuses Baroque sensibility and lyrical expression with elements of the blues, jazz, and spirituals in a strikingly contemporary sound.
Perkinson's ''Lamentations: Black/Folk Song Suite'' (1973) for solo cello is one of several excellent additions he made to the solo string repertory. He wrote that the piece ''is a reflection and statement of a people's crying out.'' It is more bluesy than elegiac, so there is plenty of rhythmic energy, color, and expressive power. Master level, Grade 6.
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