{"id":28830,"date":"2026-06-18T13:35:41","date_gmt":"2026-06-18T17:35:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/?post_type=story&p=28830"},"modified":"2026-06-18T17:19:42","modified_gmt":"2026-06-18T21:19:42","slug":"clark-conductor-choir-revive-the-memory-and-power-of-frederick-douglass","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2026\/06\/18\/clark-conductor-choir-revive-the-memory-and-power-of-frederick-douglass\/","title":{"rendered":"Clark conductor, choir revive the memory and power of Frederick Douglass"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

In 1857, Frederick Douglass stood on the stage of the newly opened Mechanics Hall in Worcester and delivered an address in which he spoke about the immorality of slavery, the Dred Scott decision that denied citizenship to Black people in the U.S, and the emancipation of the West Indies in 1838. The Civil War was four years away, the Emancipation Proclamation six years, and it would be eight years until Union soldiers reached Galveston, Texas, to free the last remaining enslaved people in the country, a day now celebrated on June 19 as Juneteenth<\/a>.      <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One hundred sixty-nine years after Douglass\u2019 words rang out, they were revived on the Mechanics Hall stage, this time set to music. \u201cFrederick: A Cantata on the Life of Frederick Douglass<\/a>\u201d had its world premiere on April 25, conducted by Cailin Marcel Manson, director of music performance at Clark, and featuring a chorus that included the Clark University Choir. Manson discussed the work on a Zoom call from Cesenatico, Italy, where he is leading\u00a0Opera al Mare<\/a>, a young artists program of Opera Vermont, of which he is music director.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"\u201cKenneth\"
Kenneth B. Morris Jr. is the 4x great-grandson of Frederick Douglass and the 2x great-grandson of Booker T. Washington. Photo: Troy B. Thompson Photography <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWorcester was a pretty significant place in the story of Frederick Douglass,\u201d Manson says. The famed abolitionist and author first spoke in Worcester in 1841, at around 23 years old, three years after escaping from his enslavers in Maryland and making his way to New York disguised as a sailor. Douglass eventually lived in New Bedford and Lynn, Massachusetts, and Rochester, New York, as well as in the United Kingdom for several years after the publication of his first autobiography in 1845, when he was still considered a fugitive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Douglass\u2019 connection to the city was recognized in 2024 as part of the Mechanics Hall Portrait Project<\/a>, which commissioned portraits of prominent Black Americans to join those already hanging in the Great Hall (Clark Professor Toby Sisson served on the selection panel). Douglass was chosen along with Sojourner Truth, who did extensive advocacy work in Worcester, and William and Martha (Tulip) Brown, Worcester business owners, community leaders, and activists involved with the Underground Railroad. The city was a major \u201cstop\u201d and a sanctuary city for those escaping slavery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was not lost on Manson that \u201cFrederick\u201d was performed under the watchful eye of artist Imo Nse Imeh\u2019s portrait of Douglass<\/a>. \u201cHe was just over my right shoulder the whole time,\u201d Manson says. But more poignantly, the audience included many of Douglass\u2019 descendants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Kenneth Morris Jr.<\/a> \u2014 who is descended from both Frederick Douglass and <\/em>Booker T. Washington, founder of the Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University) and at one time the most famous Black man in the country \u2014 addressed the audience before the performance. \u201cHe set us up perfectly,\u201d Manson says. \u201cIt was emotional because the work humanizes Frederick, and because so many of his descendants were there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe piece is pretty epic in scale,\u201d Manson says. Composer Brian Story \u2014 who died suddenly just days after completing the cantata \u2014 was inspired to write it after performing, as a member of the Worcester Chorus, in a concert Manson conducted at Mechanics Hall in 2023. The opera program had also featured selections from \u201cSongs of Harriet Tubman,\u201d a song cycle set to the words of the formerly enslaved woman and social activist. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In \u201cFrederick,\u201d Story didn\u2019t shy away from dark and \u201cheavy\u201d moments, Manson notes, even incorporating the sounds of chains and whips into the music. \u201cAt the end of a movement, Frederick says that once he learned to read, he was determined to be free, and the last sound is a chain dropping to the floor. And the crack of the whip punctuated Frederick\u2019s description of slavery as \u2018one of the great diseases of the country.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n\n\n\n
\"Cailin
Above and top photo: Cailin Marcel Manson conducts the New England Repertory Orchestra and the combined Worcester Chorus and Clark University Choir at Mechanics Hall. Photo: Troy B. Thompson Photography<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

On July 5, 1852, Douglass gave arguably his most famous speech, \u201cWhat to the Slave is the Fourth of July?<\/a>,\u201d in which he called out the irony of white Americans celebrating their freedom while keeping millions of people in bondage. Celebrating Juneteenth, Manson says, is an answer to that speech. Americans may recognize July 4, 1776, as the first Independence Day, but for Black people, independence came much later: when the last enslaved people were freed on June 19, 1865.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen we started rehearsing \u2018Frederick,\u2019 I told the Clarkies, \u2018We are in a time that seems unprecedented, where everything seems volatile,\u2019\u201d Manson says. \u201c\u2018But we are remembering one of our greatest and best, and his words are still challenging us to be better.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Conductor
Baritone Markel Reed sang the words of Frederick Douglass during the cantata. Photo: Troy B. Thompson Photography<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

One of the most poignant stories in Douglass\u2019 life, Manson says, is that when he was enslaved, the wife of his \u201cmaster\u201d saw how smart he was and started to teach him how to read. When her husband found out, the lessons stopped, but Douglass continued to learn on his own. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe struggled,\u201d Manson says. \u201cHe defied death at times. But he could not not<\/em> speak the truth. He held a mirror to society for its ills, because fundamentally, he believed it could be better.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Douglass didn\u2019t confine his advocacy to fighting for equality for Black Americans. He was also heavily involved in the women\u2019s suffrage movement and even spoke at the first National Women\u2019s Rights Convention \u2014 held in Worcester in 1850. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1847, Douglass founded an abolitionist newspaper, The North Star<\/em>. Its motto was \u201cRight is of no sex. Truth is of no color. God is the Father of us all, and we are all brethren.\u201d He believed that every law should be applied equally to every person, regardless of gender or color. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know if many of my students in the choir would have read this much Frederick Douglass had they not done this,\u201d Manson says of the concert. \u201cThe arts do more than introduce students to great ideas and great literature. They have to inhabit those ideas,\u201d even if they are unsavory and from long ago. \u201cWe\u2019re not always OK with everything we sing, but we have to wrap our minds around it, get our hearts in a place where we can acknowledge what it is and how we are different from its viewpoint, and engage with it. That process is invaluable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Music is a major part of African American culture and began as \u2014 and in many cultures still is \u2014 a communal experience, particularly during celebrations like Juneteenth, Manson says. \u201cPeople come together and make sound together. There is always music because it is a fundamental part of gathering and celebrating. Music is what connects us to each other.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Frederick Douglass was one of the first people to speak at Mechanics Hall when it opened in 1857. 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