Cook, Will Marion

Will Marion Cook Composer (William Mercer Cook, Washington, D.C., January 27, 1869; New York City, July 19, 1944). Cook was one of the first great African-American theatrical composers and a major influence on Duke Ellington. Both of his parents attended Oberlin College, and his father was a lawyer in Washington, D.C. Cook also was educated at Oberlin, and then studied composition in Germany from 1888 to 1890, thanks to family friend Frederick Douglass. When he returned to Washington, Cook…