Musicians You Should Know: Armenta Adams

Posted by Anonymous on

Basic Facts

Born: June 27, 1936, Cleveland, Ohio
Type of Performer: Composer
Genre: Classical
Awards:
  1. Two-time Martha Baird Rockefeller Aid to Music Grant recipient 
  2. Musical America Musician of the Year 
  3. National Association of Negro Musicians Competition winner
  4. First Leeds International Competition Special Prize winner 

About Armenta Adams

Born in Cleveland in 1936 to music-loving parents, Armenta Adams (Hummings) Dumisani grew up encouraged to learn music. After the family moved to Boston, she was enrolled in music lessons at age four at the New England Conservatory. She flourished and in 1954 she entered Juilliard as a piano major. She won the Juilliard piano competition in her second year and played Schumann's Piano Concerto in A Minor with the Juilliard Orchestra. Over the course of her career, she went on to perform at Avery Fisher Hall, Alice Tully Hall, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City Town Hall, and many others. She also gave concerts and toured extensively both domestically and internationally, and in 1975 she was recognized by the State Department for her contributions to international relations through these efforts. 

In 1994, she was named as Eastman's Distinguished Community Mentor. She spent her next fifteen years working in and with the community to bring music to minority and disadvantaged students. A big part of this effort was the Gateways Music Festival, founded in 1993 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Adams brought the festival with her when she moved to Rochester in 1994. The festival is a nationwide celebration of African American musicians and takes place every two years in Rochester in partnership with the Eastman School of Music. In addition to the complete orchestra of African American musicians assembled each year, there are over forty small chamber ensembles. These groups perform fifty times over six days all over the Rochester community.

She retired in 2009 and moved back to North Carolina, where she continued to perform.

Listen

"Maple Leaf Rag," by Scott Joplin (1989 performance)


"Impromptu No. 3 in G-Flat Major Op. 90," by Franz Schubert


Further Reading

Comments

Post a Comment