Gottschalk’s success on the world stage demonstrated the vitality of the Nineteenth Century New Orleans music scene. Several composers of color born in Louisiana had successful careers in Europe. Edmond Dédé, probably the most well-known of this group of artists, studied at the Paris conservatory and served as a conductor and composer in Bordeaux. Basile Barès was another prolific and popular composer of color from New Orleans. Although little is known about his early life, Barès was probably born the slave of a New Orleans piano merchant; his 1860 piano piece “Grande Polka des Chasseurs à Pied de la Louisiane,” (“The Great Polka of the Louisiana Infantry”) was published while he was still a slave. Barès studied with New Orleans musician and composer Eugène Prévost, also teacher to the young Dédé. Barès traveled several times to Europe, but unlike Dédé, chose to remain in New Orleans and to there pursue his musical career. He often performed with two other Creoles of Color, Samuel Snaër and Victor-Eugène Macarty , to whom Barès’s dedicated his piano piece, “La Belle Créole” . These musicians performed in a variety of settings including benefits for Creole of Color benevolent organizations and off-season concerts in the theaters of the city. Barès’s popularity grew even outside of the Creole sector of New Orleans. He published over twenty pieces of piano music, with both French and English titles, and led a popular string band that performed at carnival balls . As is evident in his published sheet music Barès frequently invoked the iconography of Creole New Orleans made popular by Gottschalk. Unlike Gottschalk, however, Barès’s “Creole Music for Piano” does not explicitly refer to the African influence on Creole culture. While Gottschalk incorporated the imagery of an exoticized black New Orleans into his music, Barès chose romanticized Creole images and titles for his own published compositions.
 

See: Lester Sullivan. “Composers of Color of Nineteenth Century New Orleans: The History Behind the Music.” in Creole: The History and Legacy of Louisiana’s Free People of Color. ed. Sybil Kein. (Baton Rouge: LSU Press, 2000).

Case 16 Gallery:

Sheet Music. "La Belle Créole" Basile Barès. (New Orleans: A. Elie., n.d.) in Music Collection of New Orleans Imprints.
[Hill Louisiana Rare Oversize M1. M86, Box 2 No.2]

Sheet Music "La Louisianaise. Valse Brillante." Basile Barès. (New Orleans: A.E. Blackmar, 1884).
[Hill Louisiana OS M32 .B37 L68 c.2]

Engraving. “Basile Barès”. in Nos Hommes et Notre Histoire. Rodolphe Lucien Desdunes. (Montréal: Arbour & Dupont, 1911).
[Hill Louisiana Rare F 380 C9 D47 c.2; facing p 164]

Sheet Music."La Coquette." Basile Barès. (New Orleans: A. Elie, 1866) in Music Collection of New Orleans Imprints.
[Hill Louisiana Rare Oversize M1. M86 Box 2, no. 2d]

Sheet Music. "La Créole. Souvenir de la Louisiane." Basile Barès. (New Orleans, A.E. Blackmar, 1869) in Hart-Bonnecaze-Duncan Family papers.
[OS: H, folder 82]

Engraving. “Mystic Crew of Comus”. The Illustrated London News. May 8, 1858 in Southern Scenes Engravings.
[OS: S]