George Walker: Five Sinfonias
Photographer
Frank Schramm
Frank Schramm is a photographer and filmmaker celebrated for his portraits of musicians and artists. His work encompasses a wide range of subjects which he documents meticulously, sometimes over the span of several years. A boundless curiosity and obsession with the technical and formal qualities of his subject matter challenge him to document the familiar in new and unexpected ways. His work is held in many permanent collections including the Metropolitan Museum (New York), Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery (Washington), San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Los Angeles County Museum, The Library of Congress, Victoria and Albert Museum (London), Bibliothèque nationale de France (Paris), and the Musée de l’Elysée (Lausanne).
In His Own Words; Documenting George Walker:
I had the great honor and unexpected privilege to document George Walker’s life for over 14 years. I met George after hearing one of his works on the radio back in 2004 and reached out to him the same evening to see if I could get a copy of his Sinfonia No. 3 for Orchestra which was performed by the Detroit Symphony. I did not realize that he in fact we lived in the same town, Montclair, New Jersey, until he personally hand-delivered a cassette recording, dropping it through my front door mail slot. George and I became very close friends, and I assisted him in many of his projects.
Even though he won the Pulitzer Prize and was the first African American to do so, it was a continual uphill effort for him to make contact with orchestras and have his works performed. George shared with me many times his running into “Dead ends!” in his efforts to be recognized as a classical composer. He was frequently confronted with stereotypical questions; “Are you a jazz pianist?” Is your music “Jazz oriented?” During the 14 years I spent documenting George Walker, I felt that God had placed me in the serendipitous presence of a great genius; one who became a very close friend. In 2017, I made a short film “Discovering George Walker,” which had its world premiere at the Musée de l’Elysée in Lausanne, Switzerland presented at the festival Les Nuits des Images. I also worked with George in making a video which is a projection for his now final work, Sinfonia No. 5 “Visions” for Orchestra.
