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As the Harlem Renaissance picks up steam, two composers set out to create the first all Black Broadway musical. Joined by Wynton Marsalis, Donald Macleod discovers the legacy of Shuffle Along.

The northern Manhattan neighbourhood of Harlem was meant to be an upper-class white neighbourhood, but rapid overdevelopment led to empty buildings and desperate landlords seeking to fill them. In the early 1900s, in what became known as the Great Migration, African Americans from the south moved north to New York in droves, searching for work after the war, and hoping to escape the racial violence tearing through America. Harlem became a centre for Black culture, drawing in poets like Langston Hughes, thinkers like W. E. B. Du Bois and musicians. These musicians pioneered new forms of jazz and blues, subverted the expectations of Black performers, and broke through into the mainstream. This week, Donald Macleod is joined by jazz trumpeter and composer Wynton Marsalis, as he traces the rise and fall of the Harlem Renaissance, transporting us from rent parties to nightclubs to Broadway, as we hear a joyful, soulful explosion of sound.

In 1917, Josephine Baker was just 11 years old, not yet an icon of the Jazz Age, when she stood in terror, watching race rioters burn her hometown of East St Louis. She decided then she’d do anything to get out, and her opportunity came in the form of a new Broadway musical, composed by Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle. The pair had devised a musical to be performed entirely by African-American actors, musicians and dancers - the first of its kind to feature on Broadway. It was Baker’s big break as a dancer, and some say it was the beginning of the Harlem Renaissance.

Dear Old Southland
Turner Layton, Composer
Sidney Bechet, Soprano saxophone and clarinet
Noble Sissle, Vocal
Chester Burrill, Trombone
Demas Dean, Wendell Culley and Clarence Brereton, Trumpet
Gil White and Jerome Don Pasquall, Tenor saxophone
Chauncey Haughton, Clarinet and alto saxophone
Jimmy Jones, Bass
Oscar Madera, Violin
Erskine Butterfield, Piano
Wilbert Kirk, Drums
Jimmy Miller, Guitar

Dream Rag
Eubie Blake, Composer and Piano

St Louis Blues
W. C. Handy, Composer
Selwyn Gibson, Vocals
The Americas Brass Band

Memphis Blues
W. C. Handy, Composer
Selwyn Gibson, Vocals
The Americas Brass Band

Indianola
S. R. Henry, Composer
Selwyn Gibson, Vocals
The Americas Brass Band

Shuffle Along Medley
Eubie Blake, Composer and Piano
Ivan Harold Browning, Vocals

Raggin the Rag
Eubie Blake, Composer and Piano

Memories of You
Eubie Blake, Composer and Piano

Love Will Find a Way
Eubie Blake, Composer and Piano
Noble Sissle, Composer
Ivan Harold Browning, Vocals

Everything Reminds Me of You
Eubie Blake, Composer
Noble Sissle, Composer
Ehud Asherie, Piano

Troublesome Ivories
Eubie Blake, Composer and Piano

Charleston Rag
Eubie Blake, Composer and Piano

Produced in Cardiff by Alice McKee

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