4/29/2024 0 Comments Charles schwartz born 1903 fatherAt Heyward’s recommendation, Gershwin called Ruby in for an audition. Heyward was just beginning to work with composer George Gershwin on a new opera based on Heyward’s novel, Porgy. ![]() More significantly, she became friends with the screenwriter, DuBose Heyward. It was a huge break for Ruby to make her screen debut opposite the celebrated Robeson. The producers needed an actress to play the small but important role of Dolly in the picture. In 1933, the choir was hired to appear in the film version of The Emperor Jones, starring the great singer-actor, Paul Robeson. Rosamond Johnson (brother of the famed poet, James Weldon Johnson). She sang as a soloist with the choir founded and directed by composer J. While still a student there, Ruby made her Broadway debut and began her network radio appearances. Broadway boundįrom Ohio State, Ruby went east on a Rosenwald Fellowship to study at the famed Juilliard School of Music in New York City, where she would receive two graduate degrees. By the time Ruby graduated in June 1930 (ranking first in her class from the department of music), she could both read and write music, play the piano, and perform in four languages. The three years at Ohio State completely transformed Ruby Elzy. A month later, the three Texas students apologized and said they would “consider it an honor to sit next to someone with such a wonderful voice.” Ruby displayed a remarkable ability to handle these difficult situations that won the respect and admiration of even those who at first dismissed her because of her race. On the second day of school, three students from Texas refused to sit in the same section as Ruby in the new University Chorus, and chorus director Hughes asked her if she would mind sitting in the back. When the McCracken family took Ruby with them to see a stage show and movie at a downtown theatre, she was refused admission. Just as she had in the South, Ruby had to contend with prejudice and discrimination in Ohio, even on the OSU campus. Teaching Ruby was a challenge for Hughes - despite her incredible voice, she could not read a note of music. Hughes, the founder and director of the school’s new department of music. Ruby entered Ohio State as a sophomore in September 1927. McCracken became her champion and mentor, the closest thing she ever had to a real father. Awed by Ruby’s voice, he made arrangements to enroll Ruby at Ohio State. A professor at Ohio State University, McCracken was visiting Rust on an educational study. Ruby, then a freshman at Mississippi’s Rust College in Holly Springs, was overheard singing by Dr. Her big break came on a spring day in 1927. It was a huge ambition, especially for a poor Black girl living in a segregated society. Even as a child, she dreamed of a career on stage. Ruby sang in public for the first time at age four in her church, astonishing listeners with the power and beauty of her voice. She learned Negro spirituals from her grandmother, who had been born enslaved. “Singing was as natural to us as breathing,” Ruby would recall. If life was harsh, music helped ease the burden. Ruby helped her mother with the laundry, singing as she worked. After her husband left, Emma single-handedly supported herself and her four children by teaching in the Pontotoc Colored School, picking cotton, and doing laundry for White families. Ruby’s mother, Emma, was a strong and devout woman. Ruby was only five when her father, Charlie Elzy, abandoned the family. ![]() ![]() It was the era of Jim Crow, a time when opportunities for African Americans were severely limited. Ruby Pearl Elzy was born in Pontotoc, Mississippi, on February 20, 1908. Yet for many decades after her tragic death in 1943 at the age of 35, she was largely forgotten. Ruby Elzy overcame poverty and prejudice to become one of the most illustrious singers of her generation. She sang everywhere, from Harlem's Apollo Theater to the White House, and she created a highly acclaimed role in one of the greatest American operas ever written, Porgy and Bess. Ruby Elzy was a sweet-voiced soprano from the hills of northeastern Mississippi who became a star of Broadway, radio, and the movies in the 1930s.
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