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At the beginning of the twentieth century, two conceptions of African-American music coexisted: an essentialist tendency praising popular productions, and a classical one valuing scholarly compositions. The two positions are not necessarily incompatible. For example, Harry L. Freeman (1878–1954) devoted his musical work to the search for an art form capable of expressing African-American identity and “establish[ing] irrefutable proof of the creative achievement of the great Races of the World.”