When you stop having dreams and ideals – well, you might as well stop altogether
Marian Anderson
Shattering racial barriers with her voice, Marian Anderson, a renowned contralto from Philadelphia, performed a wide variety of music all over the world. Her performance at the Lincoln Memorial on Easter Sunday, 1939 in front of 75,000 people and the millions listening over the radio came about when the Daughters of the American Revolution refused to let her sing to an integrated audience at Constitution Hall transforming this concert into an emblem of the birth of the civil rights movement in America. She also sang at the inaugurations of Eisenhower (1957) and Kennedy (1961), and in 1955 became the first African American to sing at the Metropolitan Opera.
Singing at the “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963” was another expression of her solidarity with the Civil rights movement, and as a delegate to the United Nations Human Rights Committee she contributed to share her ideals and the belief that a more just future was possible.
1897-1993, USA
Selected resources
- Audio CD “Let Freedom Ring: Live Concert From Lincoln Memorial”, restored and rereleased, 2016
- Freedman, “The Voice That Challenged a Nation: Marian Anderson and the Struggle for Equal Rights”, 2011
- Munoz, “When Marian Sang: The True Recital of Marian Anderson”, 2002