Edmond Dédé | |
|---|---|
 Edmond Dédé | |
| Background information | |
| Born | November 20, 1827 New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S. |
| Died | January 5, 1901(1901-01-05) (aged 73)[a] Paris, France |
| Genres | Classical |
| Occupation(s) | Composer,conductor |
| Instrument | Violin |
Edmond Dédé (November 20, 1827 – January 5, 1901)[a] was an American musician and composer. Afree-bornCreole, he moved to Europe in 1855. He worked inBordeaux for more than forty years, first as assistant conductor at theGrand Théâtre and then as a conductor of orchestras at other local theaters.
His compositions include works for orchestra and for various voices with orchestra or piano, as well as an operaMorgiane, for which the score was unknown until 2007.Morgiane is the earliest knownopera by anAfrican-American composer.[3] It received its first complete concert performances in February 2025.
Dédé was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, on November 20, 1827, the fourth generation of a free family of that city. His father was a marketman, poultry dealer, and music teacher.[4] As a boy, Dédé first learned theclarinet, but soon switched to theviolin, on which he was considered aprodigy. He later performed compositions of his own as well as those byRodolphe Kreutzer, a favorite composer of his. Dédé's teachers in his youth included violinists Constantin Debergue and Italian-born Ludovico Gabici, who was the director of the St. Charles Theater Orchestra. He was taught music theory byEugène Prévost and New York-born black musicianCharles-Richard Lambert, the father ofSidney andCharles Lucien Lambert.
Dédé's instruction from Gabici ended in 1848 when Dédé moved to Mexico in search of work. He returned to the US at the end of 1852 and worked as a cigar maker. In 1855, his savings financed a trip to Europe, where he visited Paris and thenBelgium, where he helped his friend Joseph Tinchant set up a branch of the Tinchant family's cigar business. He returned to Paris around 1857 and took lessons at theParis Conservatoire, studying at the Conservatoire withJean-Delphin Alard andFromental Halévy.[5]
Dédé held the conductor's title at the theater inBourges for several years,[6] and then moved to Bordeaux in 1864 to take up a position as assistant conductor for the ballet at the Grand Théâtre. Within a few years, he found employment at theThéâtre l'Alcazar, a popular concert café in the city. Later in the 1870s, he moved to the Folies Bordelaises.[7] Throughout, Dédé continued to compose art music as well as pieces in a more popular idiom suited to the city's other music venues.[8]
Samuel Snäer Jr. (1835–1900),[9] an African-American conductor and musician, conducted the first performance of Dédé'sQuasimodo Symphony on May 10, 1865, in the New Orleans Theater to a large audience of prominentfree people of color of New Orleans and Northern whites.[citation needed] In announcing the concert, theNew Orleans Tribune described Dédé as "our well-known fellow citizen" and reported that the work had been "enthusiastically received" in France.[10]
Dédé returned to New Orleans only once, in 1893. When he reached New Orleans, he participated in three benefit concerts held in his honor. New Orleans' musical innovators and musical elite, includingJelly Roll Morton's teacher, William J. Nickerson, took part in these concerts.[b] In the course of his visit, he was made an honorary member of the Société des Jeunes-Amis, a Black fraternal organization.[12]
Dédé moved to Paris in 1889.[13] He died there on January 5, 1901, in the14th arrondissement.[1][14][15] He was buried in a communal grave outside of Paris; there is no marker.[13]
In 1864 Dédé married a Frenchwoman, Sylvie Leflet. Their marriage was announced in newspapers with Black readership in New Orleans and New York. They had one son,Eugène Dédé [fr], who became a music hall conductor and composer of popular songs.[16]
Many of his compositions have been preserved at theBibliothèque nationale de France in Paris.[18]
On November 20, 2021, Google featured Dédé on its U.S. home page as aGoogle Doodle to honor his 194th birthday.[19]
Dédé's operaMorgiane had its concert premiere on February 7, 2025, at the University of Maryland Clarice Smith Performance Arts Center, 138 years after it was composed. The majority Black production was a collaboration betweenOpera Lafayette andOperaCréole,[13][15] an opera company founded in 2011 to perform works by New Orleans' 19th-century Creoles.[20] The production was performed in concert and not fully staged. Excerpts were first presented in a concert atSt. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans on January 24, 2025.[21]
le cinq janvierPage 13 of the annual table 14th arrondissement (1893–1902) D1M 937 of the registry gives 10 January 1901 as his date of death.
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