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Lorenza Jordan Cole

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Lorenza Jordan Cole
A smiling young Black woman wearing a white dress
Lorenza Jordan Cole, from a 1921 publicity photo
Born
Lorenza Jordan

August 6, 1897
Texas, U.S.
DiedApril 10, 1994 (age 96)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation(s)Pianist, music educator
RelativesYvonne Cole Meo (daughter)

Lorenza E. Jordan Cole (August 6, 1897 – April 10, 1994) was an American concert pianist and music educator, based for much of her career in Los Angeles. In 1925, she was described as "the West's great Race pianist."[1] Mary White Ovington supported Cole's education and performing career.

Early life and education

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Jordan was born in Texas and raised in California, the daughter of Edward Jordan and Amanda Olive Scott Jordan. She attended Los Angeles High School.[2] She trained as a pianist with Marie Gashweiler in Seattle,[3] and with Marguerite Melville Liszniewska at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music.[4][5] In 1930 she graduated from the Institute of Musical Art (Juilliard), with financial support arranged by Mary White Ovington of the NAACP.[6][7] She also studied in London with Tobias Matthay in 1931.[8][9] She earned a degree in music education from UCLA in 1942.[2]

Career

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Cole played concerts for radio in Ohio.[2] She gave "a recital of musical import" at the Women's Century Club in Seattle in 1928,[6][10] and at the Civic Club in New York City in 1929.[11][12] In 1931, she gave a recital in Geneva, Switzerland, featuring works by Nathaniel Dett and Samuel Coleridge- Taylor.[13] She gave a benefit concert in Los Angeles in 1932,[14] accompanied Florence Cole Talbert in 1933,[15] and toured as a concert pianist in 1920s and 1930s.[16][17][18]

Cole was head of the piano department at Tuskegee Institute from 1936 to 1939,[19][20] and a music educator in Los Angeles,[21][22] She taught music at Belvedere Junior High School for 22 years, and started the school's orchestra.[23] She gave an oral history interview to Bette Yarbrough Cox in the 1980s.[2]

Cole was an active member of Delta Sigma Theta in Los Angeles.[24][25]

Personal life

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In 1917, Jordan married Thomas Augustus Cole and moved to Seattle.[26] They had daughters Sybil (who died from pneumonia in 1922, at age 4) and Yvonne.[19] Her husband died in 1990, and Cole died in 1994, at the age of 96, in Los Angeles.

References

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  1. ^ "Lorenza Jordan-Cole in Recital". California Eagle. 1925-07-31. p. 5. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  2. ^ a b c d Cox, Bette Yarbrough. "Oral history interview with Lorenza Jordan Cole" (1980s), for the Black Experience as Expressed through Music (BEEM) series, Musical Heroes and Heroines in the Black Community of Southern California, UCLA Ethnomusicology Archive.
  3. ^ "Marie Gashweiler Presents Lorenza Cole, Negro Pianist". The Music News. 12 (2): 15. July 16, 1920.
  4. ^ "L. A. Pianist Heard in Cincinnati". California Eagle. 1926-07-16. p. 8. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  5. ^ "Along the Color Line". The Crisis: 276. August 1930.
  6. ^ a b Wintz, Cary D.; Glasrud, Bruce (2012-05-22). The Harlem Renaissance in the American West: The New Negro's Western Experience. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-136-64910-3.
  7. ^ Ovington, Mary White (1996). Black and White Sat Down Together: The Reminiscences of an NAACP Founder. Feminist Press at CUNY. pp. 109–112. ISBN 978-1-55861-156-6.
  8. ^ Savage, Barbara D. (2023-11-21). Merze Tate: The Global Odyssey of a Black Woman Scholar. Yale University Press. p. 41. ISBN 978-0-300-27481-3.
  9. ^ "Pianist Returns from Year Spent Abroad in Study". California Eagle. 1932-01-22. p. 1. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. ^ "Lorenza Jordan Cole Recital". Music and Musicians. 14: 21. October 1928.
  11. ^ "Along the Color Line" The Crisis (April 1929): 127.
  12. ^ "Lorenza Jordan Cole, Young Pianist from Seattle, Wash., Wins Favor in New York Debut at the Civic Club". The New York Age. 1929-03-09. p. 7. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  13. ^ Owens, Patricia (2025-03-11). Erased: A History of International Thought Without Men. Princeton University Press. p. 38. ISBN 978-0-691-26644-2.
  14. ^ "Plan Recital". California Eagle. 1932-03-25. pp. 1, 11. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  15. ^ "Soprano Recital Due on Thursday". The Pasadena Post. 1933-04-04. p. 3. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  16. ^ "Lorenza Jordan Cole in Recital at the Second Baptist Church". California Eagle. 1927-07-22. p. 1. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  17. ^ "Music Lovers to Have Treat in Lorenza Jordan Cole Concert". The Times-News. 1926-05-27. p. 6. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  18. ^ "Music Head to Tour". The Northwest Enterprise. 1939-05-05. p. 1. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  19. ^ a b "Weddings". Jet: 39. October 1, 1959.
  20. ^ Pool, Jeannie Gayle (2008-12-19). American Composer Zenobia Powell Perry: Race and Gender in the 20th Century. Scarecrow Press. p. 92. ISBN 978-0-8108-6377-4.
  21. ^ Graaf, Lawrence B. de; Mulroy, Kevin; Taylor, Quintard (2014-07-01). Seeking El Dorado: African Americans in California. University of Washington Press. p. 272. ISBN 978-0-295-80531-3.
  22. ^ Smith, Catherine Parsons (2007-10-16). Making Music in Los Angeles: Transforming the Popular. University of California Press. p. 175. ISBN 978-0-520-93383-5.
  23. ^ Williams, Ora (2003). American Black Women in the Arts and Social Sciences: A Bibliographic Survey. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. xxxv–xxxvi. ISBN 978-0-8108-4660-9.
  24. ^ "Two Hundred & Fifty Guests Enjoyed Delta's Annual Event". California Eagle. 1956-02-02. p. 7. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  25. ^ "Tailor civic activities to fit home life, Deltas are told". Los Angeles Tribune. 1956-02-03. p. 10. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
  26. ^ "Society Aglow". California Eagle. 1917-09-29. p. 1. Retrieved 2025-02-01 – via Newspapers.com.
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