carrie stone freeman

A prominent Los Angeles figure in the early 1900s, Carrie Stone Freeman was a pianist, vocalist, composer, music teacher, and founder of Neighborhood Music School. She also founded the Los Angeles Music School Settlement Association and was state chairman of music for the Los Angeles and Southern districts of California Federation of Women’s Clubs.

Born Carrie Amelia Stone on July 9th, 1871 in East Troy, Wisconsin, Stone Freeman had a promising start at an early age as a musical prodigy. Taking piano, voice, and organ lessons with several instructors, her studies would lead her to New York and Chicago to continue learning music and furthering her career. It was in these years Stone Freeman would craft her professional life working as a soloist, piano accompanist, and teacher assistant, building her reputation as an important and acclaimed musician.

At the age of thirty-three, Stone Freeman moved west and established herself in Los Angeles to build a new network for herself and others within the music world. As an active member of the music community, Stone Freeman advocated for music education through lectures and performances. The programs she presented included conversations with the active audience to discuss and analyze music. During these events, some of Stone Freeman’s own compositions were included and promoted across Los Angeles.

On March 2nd, 1908 (Feb 1908), Stone Freeman performed in The Wreck of Hesperus, a musical setting of the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem with music by Thomas Anderton, presented at Mammoth Hall with the St. Mark's Episcopal Church Choir. Carrie Stone Freeman believed in teaching music and actively performing; this was full participation in arts education.

Carrie Stone Freeman was a member of the Ebell Club and the Harmonia Musical Club, a group of brilliant professional musicians that discussed music through lectures, meetings, and performances, and also hosted local events. On April 27th, 1909, Stone Freeman performed several of her own works, including “Twilight” and “Bye, Honey Lamb, Bye Bye,” during a program with the Ebell Club in Highland Park as a part of a lecture on Shakespeare’s Tempest. During a November 29th, 1910 Harmonia Club event, selections from Stone Freeman’s “Slumber Sea Chanteys” were performed.

The charm Carrie Stone Freeman had in music transcended the human audience into the animal kingdom, as featured in an article on September 5th, 1912. When speaking to the Los Angeles Herald, Stone Freeman observed the power of music and how it influences a bond between humans and animals. When she was asked if she was ever afraid of the creatures in her home causing her harm, she responded with laughter, reassuring she was not afraid of the animals. She shared, “Lots of times I let them stay wherever they light on me—they never try to bite—and all they apparently want is music — Two years ago there was one little fellow (spider) which clung round all the time. We'd put him out, but he'd come back again and again.” Music as a significant connective force, as strong as language, is also noted by another observation Stone Freeman had about the birds around her home and the calling nature had with music. She said, “The birds come, too, when I'm playing. There have been five nests built (a)round our eaves this year, and when I am at the piano they flutter close to the window. I don't let them come in, but sometimes they slip In without permission. I was playing some of Beethoven's sonatas last week, and the windows were besieged by hummingbirds.”

On November 13th, 1913, Stone Freeman gave another illustrated lecture to members of the Twentieth Century Club in Long Beach, CA: American Composers; music from contemporary composers [of their time]. The program featured the following selection of works:

Ecstasy; Op. 56 No. 4 by H.H.A. Beach

“To a Wild Rose,” “At an Old Trysting Place,” “From an Indian Lodge,” and “A Deserted Farm” from Woodland Sketches by Edward MacDowell

Sleep Little Lady; Serenity by Mary Turner Salter

No. 2, “Ophelia” and No. 4, “Narcissus” from Water Scenes, Op. 13; No. 3, “Venetian Love Song” from A Day in Venice, Op. 25 by Ethelbert Nevin

Ethelinda, Op. 14, No. 2, by William H. Sherwood

Stone Freeman understood that lectures were more than analyzing music theory and more so about the effects music has with its audience. Through her years of study, we see Stone Freeman had a clear understanding that music can be taught not just by a classroom lecture, but by observations held within oneself in the body and soul; over-analyzation can make music lose its magic and the mystery it has on all of us. In April 1915, Stone Freeman gave a lecture, “How to Listen to Music,” for the Santa Barbara (CA) Music Study Club and other visiting guests. Morning Press quoted Stone Freeman as saying, “For the true enjoyment of music, let us not analyze too deeply Into the constructive realm, else we may be in the same position as one who would get deep into the heart of the rainbow, to find only drops of water. Whenever for the sake of study and knowledge we analyze an art work in order to surprise the secret of its construction, we need to recreate it, in order to recover its charm and inspiration. Music represents the self-moved activity of the soul. In no other art is the difference so great between the inspired and the mechanically put together. Whatever is bright, tender, and joyful, resolved or noble, music expresses with peculiar power. Evil lies outside its pure provinces. Something unifies all art. It must grip reality somewhere. All art is expression, adequate and harmonious.”

Among the many presentations over the years and working with several notable musicians across Los Angeles, one of the most notable colleagues and close friend to Carrie Stone Freeman was H. H. A. Beach (Amy Beach). Amy Beach, a composer and pianist from Henniker, New Hampshire, dedicated a piece of music to Stone Freeman that was inspired by the motifs sung by California meadowlarks. The piece itself, entitled Meadowlarks, features words set from a work by poet Ina Coolbirth from San Francisco, CA. The inspiration for the song came to Amy Beach one spring while visiting Riverside, CA. Hearing the songs sung by the meadowlark out in nature, she set accompaniment to the motif sung by the bird. The world premiere of Meadowlarks by Amy Beach was premiered in Los Angeles on October 27th, 1916 during a concert of her works for a group of members from the Schubert Club, and was performed by Madame Constance Balfour of Los Angeles. In return, Stone Freeman would gift as thanks to Amy Beach a collection of motifs she wrote from several different birds she heard. “There are 26 distinctly different meadowlark motifs, and these I have written down and placed in a small book for Mrs. Beach. I have also gathered six or ten mockingbird motifs. The song of the meadowlark charms us the most, however, for he keeps his song with the musical scale of the human voice.” (Riverside Daily Press, October 24th, 1916).

Activism through music lectures was just one part of Los Angeles community investments Stone Freeman gave. She also promoted other fellow composers and musicians, most notably at the Los Angeles Music School Settlement during an event on November 17th, 1921, which presented new music by a teacher and member of the school, Agnes Henderson. The first part of the program was prefaced by Stone Freeman, then followed the presentation of Anges Hernersons’ music, “Harp Song” and “Romance.” These pieces were interpreted by several musicians including Robert Byron, Gloria Mayne, Bessie Louise Householder, Ruth Thompson, Ruth Wilson, Benjamin McLaughlin, Josephine Romana, Frances Rietta, Josephine Scaccia, Mildred Black, Agnest Sustrich, Pauline Hummel, and Erma Hummel. Helping composers and musicians gain notoriety was another one of Carrie Stone Freemans’ endeavors.

On August 17th, 1947, Carrie Stone Freeman died at the age of 76. The funeral service for her cremated remains was on August 22nd at Pierce Brothers Chapel in Los Angeles, CA. Though her life was not all well known to others outside of the Los Angeles music circles, Carrie Stone Freeman's legacy continued through her compositions and the charity work. These contributions can be found in Los Angeles and San Francisco, and more broadly across California and the US. The value of education in music and art to all without judgment of race, age, gender, creed, or economic status lives on through the legacy and mission she established when she founded Neighborhood Music School. It is through Stone Freeman’s music and love of education that her life and legacy live on with us today.

-Luis Ramirez

Special thanks to:

Eileen F. King - Librarian, Los Angeles Public Library

Azalea Camacho - Archivist and Special Collection Librarian, California State University Los Angeles

Jill Fuller - Reference Librarian & Stacks Manager, Wisconsin Historical Society

Norma Yee - Librarian and Archivist, San Francisco Public Library