Grace+Bumbry

Gracy Bumbry

Grace Bumbry was born in 1937 in St. Luis, Missouri to a freight handler for the Cotton Belt Route railroad and his wife,a Mississippi schoolteacher who had once dreamed of becoming a teacher herself. There were always neighborhood kids rehearsing at the house after school, there was singing around the piano in the evenings, and there was standing around the washtub on saturdays, when the family did the laundry. Every Thursday night, the parents went off to rehearse with their church choir, while their sons, Benjamin and Charles, sang in the youth choirs. too young to stay home alone,Grace tagged along with her brothers, who eventually persuaded their choir master to let her join the group, even though she was younger than the other members.Soon she loved singing and joined the choir with her mother. Bumbry entered Summer High School with her eyes already fixed on the concert stage. Determind to learn as much as she could as fast as possible, she practiced a lot, often running home from music leasons in tears when unhappy with her own performance. In 1954 St. Luis radio station KMOX held a teenage talent contest. Billups's encouraged his 17-year-old student to enter, sharing her pleasure when she won. Grace was now the proud possessor of a $1,000 war bound, a free trip to New York, and a $1,000 scholarship to the St. Luis Institute of music. she is importent to me because with out her we would'nt have good music.