Eleanor Hague (October 7, 1875 – December 25, 1954) was an American folklorist and musicologist, who specialized in the traditional music of Latin America.

Eleanor Hague
A white woman with short sandy hair, cut in a fringe, wearing glasses
Eleanor Hague, from a 1920 newspaper
BornOctober 7, 1875
San Francisco, California
DiedDecember 25, 1954
Flintridge, California
Occupation(s)Folklorist, musicologist, antiquarian
Parent(s)James Duncan Hague and Mary Ward Foote Hague
RelativesArthur De Wint Foote (uncle); Kate Foote Coe (aunt); Margaret Foote Hawley (cousin)

Early life and education edit

 
"Mary and Eleanor Hague in a Hammock" (1883), drawing by their aunt, Mary Hallock Foote

Hague was born in San Francisco, California, the daughter of geologist and mining engineer James Duncan Hague and Mary Ward Foote Hague.[1] Through the Foote family, she was related to the Beechers and to many other prominent New England families. Writer Kate Foote Coe was her aunt; her uncle Arthur De Wint Foote was a noted engineer, and husband of book illustrator Mary Hallock Foote.[2] Another aunt married politician Joseph Roswell Hawley; his daughter, her first cousin Margaret Foote Hawley, was an artist.[3]

Hague studied music in New York and Massachusetts, and abroad in France and Italy.[1]

Career edit

As a young woman in New York, Hague was a member of the New York Oratorio Society, and was a church choir director.[1]

Hague collected, preserved, and published folk songs from Latin America and Spanish California.[4][5] She was credited as arranger on a 1925 Victor recording of "Carmela" by Dusolina Giannini.[6] She is best known for discovering the bound manuscript notebooks of Jose María García, an eighteenth-century Mexican dance master, who made shorthand notations about how to perform specific dance steps.[7] She also translated folksongs from Spanish to English, working with Luisa Espinel, Juan Bautista Rael, and Marion Leffingwell.[1] She sometimes performed the songs she collected, singing and playing piano or guitar.[8]

In 1932, Hague lectured on early Spanish music at the Los Angeles Public Library.[9] In the 1930s, she funded studies of Native American music, including composer Harry Partch's transcription of Charles Fletcher Lummis's wax cylinder recordings,[10] and Frances Densmore's anthropological work.[11]

Hague founded the Jarabe Club at a settlement house in Pasadena, California, to teach Mexican traditional music and dance to young people, and she directed the students' performances.[4][12][13] In 1941, she directed the Jarabe Club dancers when they performed in the National Folk Festival in Washington, D.C.[14]

Publications edit

  • "Mexican Folk-Songs" (1912)[15]
  • "Brazilian Songs" (1912)[16]
  • Folk songs from Mexico and South America (1914, with Edward Kilenyi)[17]
  • "Spanish Songs from Southern California" (1914)[18]
  • "Eskimo Songs" (1915)[19]
  • "Five Mexican Dances" (1915)[20]
  • "Five Danzas from Mexico" (1915)[21]
  • Spanish-American Folk Songs (1917)[22]
  • Early Spanish-Californian folk-songs (1922, with Gertrude Ross)[23]
  • Latin-American Music Past and Present (1934)[24][25]
  • "Regional Music of Spain and Latin America" (1943)[26]

Personal life and legacy edit

Hague died in 1954, at the age of 79, in Flintridge, California. She left her papers to the Southwest Museum, including the Jose María García manuscript.[27][28] In 1996, the Children of the Hague Manuscript, an ensemble of young musicians in Atascadero, California, performed music based on the Jose María García notes at several concerts.[29]

References edit

  1. ^ a b c d Koegel, John (2013). "Hague, Eleanor". Grove Music Online. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.a2283056. Retrieved March 3, 2023.
  2. ^ "The Foote Family". The North Star House. Retrieved March 3, 2023.
  3. ^ "Margaret Foote Hawley". Smithsonian American Art Museum. Retrieved March 3, 2023.
  4. ^ a b Martí, Samuel; Hague, Eleanor (1969). The Eleanor Hague Manuscript of Mexican Colonial Music. Southwest Museum.
  5. ^ Jones, Isabel Morse (May 6, 1934). "Latin American Music and Dance Lasting Inspiration". The Los Angeles Times. p. 38. Retrieved March 4, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
  6. ^ "Eleanor Hague". Discography of American Historical Recordings. Retrieved March 3, 2023.
  7. ^ "Joseph María García Manuscript: Volume 1, Eleanor Hague Collection". Los Californios: Music and Dance of Mexican-Era California. Retrieved March 3, 2023.
  8. ^ "Well-Known Authority on American Folk Songs". The Pasadena Post. October 8, 1920. p. 7. Retrieved March 4, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. ^ "Pre-Bach Spanish Music Library Lecture Topic". The Los Angeles Times. March 6, 1932. p. 43. Retrieved March 4, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. ^ Gilmore, Bob (January 1, 1998). Harry Partch: A Biography. Yale University Press. p. 93. ISBN 978-0-300-06521-3.
  11. ^ Jensen, Joan M.; Patterson, Michelle Wick (June 1, 2015). Travels with Frances Densmore: Her Life, Work, and Legacy in Native American Studies. U of Nebraska Press. p. 195. ISBN 978-0-8032-4873-1.
  12. ^ "Jarabe Dancers to Present Play". Pasadena Independent. October 13, 1948. p. 28. Retrieved March 4, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
  13. ^ "Jarabe dancers at Museum Sunday". The Highland Park News-Herald. March 24, 1939. p. 2. Retrieved March 4, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
  14. ^ Jones, Isabel Morse (April 12, 1942). "Sharps and Flats". The Los Angeles Times. p. 55. Retrieved March 4, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
  15. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1912). "Mexican Folk-Songs". The Journal of American Folklore. 25 (97): 261–267. doi:10.2307/534822. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 534822.
  16. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1912). "Brazilian Songs". The Journal of American Folklore. 25 (96): 179–181. doi:10.2307/534810. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 534810.
  17. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1914). Folk songs from Mexico and South America. New York: Gray pref.
  18. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1914). "Spanish Songs from Southern California". The Journal of American Folklore. 27 (105): 331–332. doi:10.2307/534627. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 534627.
  19. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1915). "Eskimo Songs". The Journal of American Folklore. 28 (107): 96–98. doi:10.2307/534562. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 534562.
  20. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1915). "Five Mexican Dances". The Journal of American Folklore. 28 (110): 379–381. doi:10.2307/534853. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 534853.
  21. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1915). "Five Danzas from Mexico". The Journal of American Folklore. 28 (110): 382–389. doi:10.2307/534854. ISSN 0021-8715. JSTOR 534854.
  22. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1917). Spanish-American Folk-songs ... and New York, The American folklore society.
  23. ^ Early Spanish-Californian folk-songs, New York: J. Fischer & Bro., 1922, retrieved March 3, 2023
  24. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1934). Latin American music, past and present. Santa Ana, Calif.: The Fine arts press.
  25. ^ Corbató, Hermenegildo (March 1, 1936). "Review: Latin-American Music Past and Present, by Eleanor Hague". Pacific Historical Review. 5 (1): 84–86. doi:10.2307/3633326. ISSN 0030-8684. JSTOR 3633326.
  26. ^ Hague, Eleanor (1943). "Regional Music of Spain and Latin America". Bulletin of the American Musicological Society (7): 26. doi:10.2307/829339. ISSN 1544-4708. JSTOR 829339.
  27. ^ Russell, C. H. (2019). "The Eleanor Hague manuscript: A sampler of musical life in eighteenth-century Mexico", Inter-American Music Review 14(2), 39 – 62.
  28. ^ "Eleanor Hague Collection, album". The Autry Museum of the American West. Retrieved March 3, 2023.
  29. ^ James, Adam St (June 7, 1996). "Young musicians bring lost treasure to life". The Tribune. p. 20. Retrieved March 4, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.

External links edit

  • Evelyn Louise McCarty, "A Performance Edition of Selected Dances from the Eleanor Hague Manuscript of Music from Colonial Mexico" (Northwestern University, D.M.A. dissertation, 1981).
  • "Marian and Eleanor Hague in a Hammock" (1883), a drawing by Mary Hallock Foote, in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery