Sunday 27 January 2019

DR. DONALD WALBRIDGE SHIRLEY

Murphy Browne © January 27-2019

DR. DONALD WALBRIDGE SHIRLEY





DR. DONALD WALBRIDGE SHIRLEY





Donald Walbridge Shirley whose life was dramatized, fictionalized and some say trivialized in a recent movie “Green Book” was born on January 29-1927 in Pensacola, Florida to African Jamaican immigrants. Donald Walbridge Shirley was the third of 4 sons of Reverend Edwin Samuel Shirley and elementary school teacher Stella Gertrude Young Shirley. Reverend Edwin Samuel Shirley attended Mico College in Jamaica and was a schoolmaster before immigrating to the USA in 1914; he attended the Divinity School at Howard University, then served as the priest at the St. Cyprian’s Episcopal, Church in Pensacola, Florida. Stella Gertrude Young Shirley was 32 years old when she transitioned to the ancestral realm on May 8-1936; her youngest child was only two days old and Donald was 9 years old.  





Donald Walbridge Shirley began playing piano when he was 2 ½ years old; taught by his mother. He was a musical prodigy who gave his first public performance when he was 3 years old. On June 25-1945 Donald Walbridge Shirley was 18 when he made his debut as a professional pianist (performing Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat minor) with the Boston Symphony Orchestra as part of their “Colored American Night” series of concerts. In 1946, his first major composition was performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra.








Donald Shirley, a musical prodigy was thwarted by the White supremacist American culture from fulfilling his ambition to become a concert pianist. He was told: “American audiences were not willing to accept a ‘colored’ pianist on the concert stage.” He turned his attention to the academic field where he obtained Doctorates in Music, Psychology (University of Chicago) and Liturgical Arts. While teaching Psychology at the University of Chicago in the early 50's he returned to a musical career when he received a grant to study the possible relationship between music and juvenile crime. He performed experiments which showed that certain tonal combinations affected the reactions of the audience in a nightclub. He studied music at the Catholic University of America in Washington and graduated in 1953.








Dr. Donald Shirley returned to his musical career where he was a prolific composer, developing his own genre of music, melding blues, spirituals, show tunes and popular music. The original music Shirley composed included at least three symphonies, two piano concertos, a cello concerto, three string quartets and a one-act opera, a symphonic tone poem based on "Finnegan's Wake" and a set of "Variations" on the legend of Orpheus in the Underworld. In 1955, Dr. Shirley made his Carnegie Hall debut with iconic African American composer/musician Duke Ellington and the Symphony of the Air Orchestra. Shirley performed with the Detroit Symphony, the Chicago Symphony and the Cleveland Orchestra. He performed in varied prestigious venues including Milan's La Scala Opera House and New York's Metropolitan Opera House. He recorded 24 albums between 1955-62.








In 1962 Dr. Shirley decided to take his music on the road but was aware of the vicious physical attack on Nat King Cole by a group of White supremacists 6 years before (April 10-1956) in Alabama. He decided to employ Frank Anthony “Tony Lip” Vallelonga, a proudly racist Italian-American bouncer who worked at Manhattan's Copacabana nightclub, to work as his chauffeur/bodyguard. The “relationship” was fraught with the tension of an African American man in close quarters with a known, vocal White supremacist. The relationship between African-Americans and Italian-Americans was anything but cordial or friendly. Italian American and African American relations have generally been characterized as hostile with the murder of 16-year-old African American Yusuf Hawkins on August 23-1989 by a group of Italian men in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, New York as an example. This was compounded when 300 African-Americans marched through the neighborhood demanding justice for Yusuf Hawkins’s murder were confronted by Italian-Americans chanting “Nig--rs go home,” screaming obscenities and holding up watermelons. The Reverend Al Sharpton, leading the march was stabbed by one of the Italian-Americans. With this history it is hardly likely that any kind of “friendship” between Dr. Donald Shirley and his racist Italian-American chauffeur/bodyguard “Tony Lip” would be viable.








The 2018 movie “Green Book” told through the eyes of “Tony Lip” (by his son Nick Vallelonga) would have us suspend belief and watch a complete retelling of reality in this movie. Similar to the 2011 movie “The Help” that glorified the “liberal” White woman journalist involved in saving/empowering 2 African American domestic workers in White supremacist Jim Crow South, a racist Italian-American bodyguard/chauffeur teaches an African-American how to be “Black.” What would a racist Italian-American know about how to be “Black” other than what was in his feverishly racist imagination? The stereotypes that abound about African Americans among many white Americans, including Italian-Americans, are legion and legendary! According to members of Dr. Shirley’s family (who describe the movie as a “symphony of lies,”) Dr. Shirley was active in the civil rights movement, friends with Dr. King, marched with Dr. King in Selma and was close friends with Nina Simone, Duke Ellington and Sarah Vaughn. He was accompanied by the Alvin Ailey dancers when he performed "Concerto in F" at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. So much for the myth that “Tony Lip” had to teach Dr. Shirley anything about his culture and history. The movie also portrays Dr. Shirley as being “estranged” from his family which is a fabrication. Dr. Shirley had a close relationship with his siblings as evidenced by photographs and the words of the surviving family members. Dr. Shirley obviously knew about “The Negro Motorist Green Book” so he was “Black” enough to know about that and the fact that his life could be in danger as he was “travelling while Black” through the USA. Tony Lip would not have known about “The Negro Motorist Green Book” before being employed by Dr. Shirley.








The title of the movie comes from “The Negro Motorist Green Book” which was a travel guide for African Americans published from 1936-1966. African-American Victor Hugo Green and his wife Alma Green documented restaurants, hotels, gas stations and more, that African-American travelers could use while traveling throughout the USA to remain safe. Dr. Shirley would have needed the Green Book for his safety. Members of his family insist that Dr. Shirley was never friends with his employee Tony Lip; it was an employer-employee relationship. Dr. Shirley eventually fired Tony Lip most likely for being a rabid racist. The Green Book seems to be a valiant effort to make White supremacy and racism funny and palatable. Members of Dr. Shirley’s family insist that D      r. Shirley “flatly refused” permission to have his story told when he was approached by Nick Vallelonga to do a movie about his life 30 years ago.











In 2018, five years after Dr. Shirley transitioned to the ancestral realm (April 6-2013) Nick Vallelonga defied the wishes of Dr. Shirley and made the movie. Although the story is supposedly about the life of Dr. Shirley, the main character is the white man Tony Lip. The actor portraying Tony Lip spent time with Lip's family. Mahershala Ali (who portrayed Dr. Shirley and gained a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor) only watched movie clips of Dr. Shirley as if Dr. Shirley dropped from the sky or was delivered by a stork. The producers, writers etc., most likely out of disrespect for the African American family of Dr. Shirley did not do due diligence in contacting the family. They only seem to have seen Dr. Shirley as a prop to telling the story of Tony Lip, whitewashing the life, culture and history of the African American man, Dr. Donald Shirley, his family and community. The Green Book is about a White man's "understanding" and his interpretation of who an educated “Negro” was in the 1960s; the story of how the child of a racist Italian-American interpreted the stories his father told him about a "road trip" adventure/incident he (the father) had with an "uppity Negro" in the 1960s.








It was a time of turbulent change in the USA when African Americans rose up in numbers to demand their Human Rights. That is mostly glossed over if not outright disregarded. The makers of the Green Book had to take into account the awareness of white privilege in the 21st century and social media holding white supremacists accountable. They tried it; trying to make white supremacy funny! In spite of their efforts, The Green Book remains the latest in a string of movies made to salve the conscience of White people and absolve them of the crimes committed against racialized people from the beginning of the nation. The Shirley family is making their voice heard, correcting the false narrative of the Green Book movie. Dr. Shirley’s family is (https://www.blackenterprise.com/don-shirley-the-green-book-family-blasts-movie/) “calling for a boycott of the film and asking moviegoers to wait to watch until it appears on cable.”





Murphy Browne © January 27-2019






















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