Marva Griffin Carter

Not to be confused with the Italian arts administrator and curator Marva Griffin.

Marva Griffin Carter
Alma mater	Boston Conservatory at Berklee New England Conservatory of Music Boston University University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Occupation	Musicologist, musician, organist, university teacher
Employer	Georgia State University Morris Brown College Simmons University
Spouse(s)	Lawrence Carter
Awards	lifetime achievement award (Society for American Music)

Marva Griffin Carter is an American musician, composer, musicologist, and author. She has worked as an academic administrator and professor at Georgia State University since 1993. In 2020 the Society for American Music recognized her work with a Lifetime Achievement Award, granted "in recognition of the recipient's significant and substantial lifetime achievement in scholarship, performance, teaching, and/or support of American Music." ^{[1] [2]}

Early life and education

Carter graduated from the Boston Conservatory (now Boston Conservatory at Berklee) with a Bachelor of Music in Piano Performance, and received a Master of Music from the New England Conservatory of Music. She then earned a second master's degree in musicology from Boston University in 1975. In 1988 she received a doctorate (PhD) from the University of Illinois at Urbana. ^[3]

The subject of her master's thesis at Boston University was the composer Hall Johnson. ^[4] Her PhD dissertation was titled The life and music of Will Marion Cook . ^{[5] [6] [a]}

She has spoken of a serendipitous meeting in 1970 with the musicologist Eileen Southern, who inspired her to pursue an academic career, saying of the encounter, "[she] basically recruited me," and "I would not have achieved what I have, or even pursued my areas of interest were it not for her." ^[7]

Work and career

Carter began her academic career as coordinator of the African American Studies Program at Simmons University, Boston. ^[3] She then became the chair of the Music Department at Morris Brown College in Atlanta, Georgia. ^[3] Since 1993 she has worked as an academic administrator and professor at Georgia State University, where she served as Assistant Director, later Director of Graduate Studies, and currently, Co-Chair of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee in the School of Music. ^{[3] [8]} She was the 1998 Barbara Jordan/W. E. B. DuBois Award for Outstanding Teaching recipient. ^[2]

She is a member of the American Musicological Society and the Society for American Music. ^{[3] [2]}

Her book Swing Along: The Musical life of Will Marion Cook was published in 2008. ^{[9] [10]}

Carter was the organist for Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. She is also writing a book about the sacred musical traditions and repertoire of the historic church. ^[3]

In 2020, her work was recognized with the Society for American Music's Lifetime Achievement Award. ^[3]

Carter was featured in Harvard Radcliffe Institute's 2022 webinar Black Music and the American University: Eileen Southern's Story. ^{[11] [12]}

Personal life

Griffin Carter is married to the historian and civil rights scholar Lawrence Carter. They have one son, Lawrence Edward Carter Jr. ^{[13] [14]}

Publications

• Griffin Carter, Marva. Hall Johnson – Preserver of the Old Negro Spiritual (1880–1970). www.worldcat.org. Retrieved 2023-03-24. (Master's thesis, Boston University, 1975) ^[4]
• Griffin Carter, Marva. Roland Hayes–Expressor of the Soul in Song (1887–1977), The Black Perspective in Music, Autumn 1977, 188.
• Griffin Carter, Marva. The life and music of Will Marion Cook. Thesis, Dissertation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. 1988 – via WorldCat. ^[6]
• Carter, Marva Griffin. The "New Negro" Legacy of Will Marion Cook. Afro-Americans in New York Life and History (1999). Vol.23 (1), p.25-37 ^[15]
• The "New Negro" Choral Legacy of Hall Johnson, Chorus and community, Ahlquist, Karen, ed. (2006). Urbana: University of Illinois Press. ISBN   0-252-03037-0. OCLC   62281651 ^[16]
• Weisenfeld, Judith (2011). "The Secret at the Root": Performing African American Religious Modernity in Hall Johnson's Run, Little Chillun. Religion and American Culture: A Journal of Interpretation. 21 (1): 39–80. doi : 10.1525/rac.2011.21.1.39 ISSN   1052-1151 ^[17]
• Carter, Marva Griffin (2008). Swing along: the musical life of Will Marion Cook. Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-986579-6 OCLC   875519263 ^{[9] [18]}
• Colloquy: Shadow Culture Narratives: Race, Gender, and American Music Historiography, Journal of the American Musicological Society (2020) 73 (3): 711–784. ^[19]

Notes

1. This work was also the basis for Griffin's later published book on the same subject (see Publications).

References

1. "2020 Lifetime Achievement Award to Dr. Marva Griffin Carter – Georgia State University News – College of the Arts, Faculty, Music –". Georgia State University (News Hub). June 22, 2020. Retrieved March 24, 2023.
2. "Lifetime Achievement Award Honorees". Society for American Music . Retrieved March 24, 2023.
3. "Marva Griffin Carter". Georgia State University, School of Music. Retrieved March 24, 2023.
4. Griffin Carter, Marva. "Hall Johnson – preserver of the Old Negro spirrtual (1880–1970) | WorldCat.org". www.worldcat.org. Retrieved March 24, 2023.
5. Carter, Marva Griffin (1988). "The Life and Music of Will Marion Cook". Graduate Theses and Dissertations at Illinois. hdl:2142/70866 – via University of Illinois, IDEALS, the Illinois Digital Environment for Access to Learning and Scholarship.
6. "The life and music of Will Marion Cook". Thesis, Dissertation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. 1988 – via WorldCat.
7. "Note by note. Eileen Southern, AB'40, AM'41 (1920–2002), rewrote the history of American music". The University of Chicago Magazine. Retrieved March 24, 2023.
8. "Marva Griffin Carter, Georgia State University scholars". gsu.discovery.academicanalytics.com. Retrieved May 19, 2023.
9. Carter, Marva Griffin (2008). Swing along : the musical life of Will Marion Cook. Oxford University Press. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-986579-6. OCLC   875519263.
10. "'My Lady Nicotine' by Will Marion Cook". Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20540 USA. Retrieved May 28, 2024.
11. "Black Music and the American University: Eileen Southern's Story". Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University. Retrieved March 24, 2023.
12. Doan-Nguyen, Ryan H.; Caleb H. Painter (April 8, 2022). "Music Scholars Discuss the Legacy of Harvard Professor Eileen Southern at Radcliffe Event". The Harvard Crimson . Retrieved March 29, 2023.
13. "Lawrence Edward Carter Sr., PH.D., D.D., D.H., D.R.S., D.H.C., MULT". Morehouse College . Retrieved April 19, 2017.
14. "Dr. Lawrence Carter, Sr., '60, Educator – West High Alumni Association". westhighalumni.com. Retrieved March 24, 2023.
15. Carter, Marva Griffin. "The "New Negro" Legacy of Will Marion Cook". i-share-niu.primo.exlibrisgroup.com. ISSN   0364-2437 . Retrieved March 24, 2023.
16. Ahlquist, Karen, ed. (2006). Chorus and community. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. ISBN   0-252-03037-0. OCLC   62281651.
17. Weisenfeld, Judith (2011). ""The Secret at the Root": Performing African American Religious Modernity in Hall Johnson's Run, Little Chillun" . Religion and American Culture: A Journal of Interpretation. 21 (1): 39–80. doi:10.1525/rac.2011.21.1.39. ISSN   1052-1151. JSTOR   10.1525/rac.2011.21.1.39.
18. Swing Along: The Musical Life of Will Marion Cook. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press. September 11, 2008. ISBN   978-0-19-510891-0.
19. "Colloquy: Shadow Culture Narratives: Race, Gender, and American Music Historiography". online.ucpress.edu. Retrieved March 24, 2023.

External links

• Marva Griffin Carter Biography, Georgia State University
• American Popular Song Series: Will Marion Cook (Marva Griffin Carter, et al. on NPR, Fresh Air with Terry Gross, 2001)
• American Popular Song: Will Marion Cook's Lyrics and Life (Marva Griffin Carter, et al. on NPR, Fresh Air with Terry Gross, 2000)