William Brown (b.1938) is an operatic tenor who has performed with the New York City Opera, Baltimore Opera, Florentine Opera, Goldovsky Opera, Opera South, Opera Ebony, Lake George Opera Festival, Berkshire Music Festival and the Brevard Music Festival. His repertoire of operatic roles includes Florestan from Beethoven’s Fidelio, Tamino from Mozart’s Die Zauberflöteand early Verdi tenor roles, to Nathan Johnson in Dorothy Moore’s Frederick Douglass. He is also a champion of African-American composers such as William Grant Still, T. J. Anderson and George Walker, having premiered a great many of their compositions. Mr. Brown is a Professor of Voice at the University of North Florida in Jacksonville.
Mel Foster: How many years have you been singing professionally?
William Brown: My career started professionally in 1968. I was in Baltimore, Maryland. I auditioned for the symphony and they hired me. From there I went to Tanglewood, where I was heard by George Shirley. It was he who brought me back to New York and told his agent that she should sign me. I shall never ever forget that, because without that kind of a push I don’t think I would be here today. He went out on the limb for me based on the performance that I did of Fidelio in Tanglewood.
M.F.: Was there difficulty in finding management?
W.B.: Oh… extremely difficult. I hadn’t even started thinking about getting management. I was still in the mind-set of honing my craft. Well, as you know, Tanglewood auditions hundreds of singers for their Festival Singers program. They audition singers from all over the world and select only 25. I was selected and in my class was Phyllis Bryn-Julson and Neva Pilgrim. Strangely enough, we all gravitated toward new music due to the fact that we could sight-read very well.
I’ll never forget that there were auditions for Bach’s Cantata 91. Seiji Osawa, Gunther Schuller and someone else of great prestige were listening to all of the singers. I decided to sing the aria from the Bach cantata. It just so happened that the piano vocal score had not been published and the copies for the performance had not arrived yet. So I went to Pittsfield, Massachusetts, because I knew that New England libraries were usually pretty good sources for art and music. Can you believe that this public library had the complete Bach Gesellschaft? I made a reproduction of the score for voice and piano. Originally it was scored for three oboes (which meant no transposition) and continuo. I went the next morning and sang it. They were really surprised. Well, after they heard me, they asked where I had gotten the score, since theirs hadn’t arrived yet. When I told them what I had done, they gave me the solo because not only was I a tenor who could read, but I could make a reproduction of the score. That really catapulted me as a musician. That’s really what I wanted to do.
Quite frankly, at that time my voice was not all that… it’s not all that even now. I always said that if you give me five minutes, I’m going to touch you with my honesty. Then the listener forgets about whatever lack of vocal quality I may have and focuses on what we all should be thinking about–the message within the song.
M.F.: It appears that only a small number of African-American tenors have been able to establish careers in opera. What roles have you performed?
W.B.: I’ve performed most of the early Verdi, Puccini, and lots of Mozart. Yes, that was a problem. As a matter of fact, when I went to Indiana University in 1960, I was taking a calculated gamble. I figured that the revolution was right around the corner, and that when the dust settled, the public was going to want to know an awful lot about black people. Hence, I began my research into black composers way back in 1959. Everybody said that I was stupid to waste my time on such a thing.
I also realized that the crux of the problem here in America stems from finances. Slavery was more concerned with economics than with the color of your skin or racism. Racism in my opinion has a way of deferring the real problem. The real problem is about the ’haves’ and the ’have nots’. It’s convenient to look upon you as an African-American and maintain that facade which does not address the problem between the ’haves’ and the ’have nots’, be they black, green or blue. If we’re talking about an art form which supposedly highlights the best in homo sapiens, then how could you possibly justify dealing with someone whose heritage comes from slavery? Psychologically, that thought continues to exist.
Then you have to understand that when I came along, I was born in Mississippi and practically grew up there. I drank out of separate fountains. I was in Mississippi when they killed Emmett Teal and all he did was look at a White woman. So if an African-American male is onstage being amorous with a white woman, that’s a little bit much, even today. Those vestiges are still there. Slavery and the whole nine yards were about that. It’s still about that today. The orchestras are owned by whom? The opera companies are owned by whom? Who participates in these companies? So they say, “What are you talking about? Your people are not here in this opera house, so what are you talking about?”
But you see the conflict comes in with the constitution of this country which states in part that we should have access to equal opportunity. When you deny me simply because I have shades of black as a skin color, then you are going against the Constitution of the United States. That’s where my argument is. It’s not about how many black folks are in the orchestra or how many black folks are coming to see me sing. I will say that art, at its best, has to be prophetic and pure. We also know that a great deal of the parading around in this business is a manifestation of what’s currently happening in society. Coupled with that, there seems to be some kind of logical justification for keeping you out based on the color of your skin. However, if you look at our Constitution there is no justification. To deny a human soul of providing esthetic beauty in this country or in this world… Who’s to say that we aren’t capable of finding the cure to diseases? Who’s to say that when dealing with beauty that we cannot render the highest form of beauty?
I was hired at Lake George in the late 60s. Lake George in the summer was a big deal in this country at that time. I was hired to sing of all things Romeo in Gounod’s Romeo and Juliette, Donizetti’s Don Pasquale, and the premiere of David Amram’s Twelfth Night. Boris Goldovsky came to be the stage director for Don Pasquale. After rehearsals began, he invited me to lunch one afternoon. He said in a slightly high-pitched voice, “My boy, I want to see your make-up”. Now we all called him Mr. G, so I said, “Mr. G., why do you want to see my make-up?” He proceeded to pose an argument about theatrical believability. Well, in those days, I was sort of known as the Malcolm X of the opera world because I was always raising holy hell, writing letters to different publications and things. I asked, “What’s all of this about?” He looked somewhat surprised that the only black person there wasn’t just happy to be there. I also had this wit which would make people laugh, and they mistook that for my seriousness. I then said, “I’m not exactly sure what this is about”. He repeated himself. Then I said, “Listen, Mr. G. Last month I saw Verdi’s Don Carlos. When Don Carlos and Rodrigo sing their duet, Don Carlos has just been stabbed fatally. Nine minutes later, he dies. What’s theatrically believable about that? You tell me. The opera world is all make believe. We’re talking about voices. Mr. G, in my opinion, you are one of the most powerful men in opera in this world. If you’re telling me that you are buckling down to the ways of this country, then it is time for me to burn the Metropolitan Opera down.” I was dead serious. When it finally hit him, he understood where I was coming from. That next year, he invited me to come with him on his national tour.
I toured with Goldovsky all throughout this country. I sang the role of Don Ottavio in Mozart’s Don Giovanni. Many times they wouldn’t put my picture in the paper. I went to Mississippi, ’Ole Miss’, and when I came out onto the stage, the audience gasped. My home state… I mean, I grew up in Mississippi… Well, today I have my own day in Mississippi. That incident happened to me there and in Chattanooga, Tennessee. In the end, I think that Mr. G was moved because I stood up for what I wanted. I mean to tell you that it was awful, but it was something that I loved to do.
When I decided that I was beating my head against a wall and needed to do some more diverse things, had it not been for my dealings with orchestral performances, recitals, chamber music, and eventually contemporary music, I probably would not be talking with you today. Those [African-Americans] who started out and only focused on opera are not around anymore… I’m still going strong.
M.F.: Is there any advice that you would give to young tenors like myself? Would you say to be as diverse as possible?
W.B.: Definitely. I would say that unless you are an Otello voice, one of those rare things where you could live in outer-Mongolia and take your messages by bird… or a true Siegfried voice, then you could live anywhere and do whatever you wanted. There aren’t any [of those voices] on the scene today. Believe it or not, there are Pavarottis and Domingos out there. They just don’t get the same press. Even still, there is work to be had. Anytime I sing ’Nessun dorma’ with an orchestra today, the audience begins applauding and standing up because they’re so familiar with the song. If I were a young man coming up, the first thing that I would do is to become an astute musician. Then I would listen to everybody that I could.
M.F.: Did you have any opera heroes?
W.B.: My heroes were Roland Hayes, Nicolai Gedda, Gerard Souzay and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. I treasured them all because they were intellectuals. I could understand their diction, and they were musicians. I wanted to be a brain and not just a voice. I wanted to be thinking about an artist’s place in society. I wanted to be as philosophically and historically grounded as I was musically. I figured that if I did that then I could avoid having to follow the pack. As long as you have knowledge in your head, you will be used. Knowledge cannot be held back. It won’t be easy but you have to know your craft.
M.F.: Having sat on panels for auditions and having given master classes, would you say that the young African-Americans appear to be unprepared? I know it is a sweeping accusation but would you say that their musical education appears to be less complete?
W.B.: I would say that every generalization has a modicum of truth in or it wouldn’t be a generalization. It is not because they cannot do. I can’t say definitively why they do not.
