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michael daugherty: rosa parks boulevard (2000) Rosa Parks Boulevard for Three Trombones and Orchestra (2000) is the third and final movement of MotorCity Triptych which was commissioned by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Neeme Jarvi, music director. Rosa Parks Boulevard pays tribute to the woman who helped set in motion the modern civil rights movement in America by her refusal to move to the back of the bus in 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama. After her arrest, the black people of Montgomery organized a boycott of the city bus line to protest racial. The Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. was the spokesperson for the nonviolent "Montgomery Bus Boycott" which lasted 381 days. The boycott ended in 1956, after the U.S. Supreme Court declared bus segregation unconstitutional. This historic ruling signaled the end of institutionalized segregation Born in 1913, Rosa Parks moved from Alabama to Detroit, Michigan in 1957 where she has lived ever since. One of the many honors bestowed upon Rosa Parks, is a boulevard named after her, located in Detroit. An example of quiet courage, dignity, and determination, Rosa Parks endures as a symbol of civil rights. For more than four decades, Rosa Parks has attended the St. Matthew African Methodist Episcopal Church in Detroit. This modest church has the motto "The Church Where Everybody is Somebody" hand-painted over its entrance. The spirit of the African American preacher has been a source of strength for Rosa Parks from her association with Martin Luther King, Jr. in the 1950s and 60s to the present day. The African American poet James Weldon Johnson was also inspired by the voice of the preacher in his 1927 volume of poetry, entitled God’s Trombones. In his preface, he describes how the preacher "strode the pulpit up and down in what was actually a very rhythmic dance, and he brought into play the full gamut of his wonderful voice, a voice-what shall I say? ------not of an organ or a trumpet, but rather of a trombone, the instrument possessing above all others, the power to express the wide and varied range of emotions encompassed by the human voice – and with greater amplitude. He intoned, he moaned, he pleased – he blared, he crashed, he thundered. I sat fascinated; and more, I was, perhaps against my will, deeply moved; the emotional effect upon me was irresistible." In the fall of 1999, I had the pleasure of attending a Sunday service with Rosa Parks at her church in Detroit. During the four hour service, I joined in with Rosa Parks and the congregation to sing various gospel hymns and hear the inspired oratory from the preacher, Reverend Robinson. After the church service, Rosa Parks told me her favorite piece of music was the traditional African American spiritual Oh Freedom. In Rosa Parks Boulevard, fragments of this melody are played by the trombone section, echoing the voices of many generations of African American preachers in Detroit and throughout America. In addition, I composed a lyrical motive which I associate with Rosa Parks. This expressive motive is first heard in the woodwinds and vibraphone and played later in canon by the soulful trombones. Challenging racial segregation in the South was not an easy road: I alternate these lyrical sections with a turbulent bus ride, evoked by atonal polyrhythms in the trumpets, horns and percussion instruments. The recurrence of ominous beating in the bass drum reminds us that while progress was made in civil rights in the twentieth century, there is still much to be done in the twenty-first century. Michael Daugherty
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