Mary Violet Leontyne Price was born in 1927 in Laurel Mississippi, 93 year old Mary Violet Leontyne Price, showed signs of being a precocious music talent rather early in life. Her father and mother bought her a toy keyboard at 3 and she played with it often. Even as an older child, she found work through her mother in a local wealthy womans home as a housekeeper and babysitter, taking advantage of the homes music room on her work breaks. Her parents were fortunate enough to send their daughter to college at Wilberforce University in Ohio. There she joined the choir and excelled. By now it was the 1940’s and mentors suggested she should attend Julliard in new York to study music. Paul Robeson, threw a benefit concert for her in Dayton, Ohio in the late forties to raise funds to send her. Once there, she tried out for roles and solo venues to display her talents.
She began to tour nationally and internationally, principally with the production of Porgy and Bess which took her to tour most European capitals. She also at this time married a performer, William Warfield, who was also cast in Porgy and Bess. He was subsequently dropped from the production and, as she continued to tour, long periods of time away from one another strained the marriage leading to divorce in the early seventies. However, Leontyne’s career was on the rise. She became the first Black opera singer to perform at New York’s Metropolitan Opera House in the early fifties. In 1958 she debuted in Vienna and London’s Royal Opera House as the character Aida.

Contribution by Ms. C. Buford for Black History Month 2020