Oriental Opera Company

Mr. Graffe, a millionaire from Syracuse, New York, wanted to prove to the world that Negroes could sing opera music as well as folk songs and financed for one year a company known as the Oriental Opera Company. Madam Plato and Sidney Woodward were the star singers and Mr. J. Rosemond Johnson was the musical director. Miss Eartha M. White, a lyric soprano from the National Conservatory of Music, was accepted as a singer. They opened at the Palmer Theater on Broadway in New York City and proved to be so successful that they traveled for one year in the United States and Europe. The above photograph is from 1893.

Source: Eartha M M White Collection