The Story and Music of of Slave, Savant, Pianist and Composer – Blind Tom Wiggins

Originally presented at the Cleveland Public Library Main Branch

Performed with members and friends of the Broadway School of Music

“I am astounded. I cannot account for it, no one can. No one understands it,” a St Louis man uttered after watching Blind Tom perform in concert in 1866. His mystification was by no means isolated. Few other performers on the nineteenth century stage aroused as much curiosity as “Blind Tom” Wiggins. Born a slave in Georgia in 1848, by the time he died Hoboken in 1908, he was an international celebrity and his name was a byword for inexplicable genius.

From an early age, it was clear that Blind Tom possessed extraordinary musical gifts. He could imitate, either vocally or musically, any sound he heard. This, coupled with an encyclopedic memory and all-encompassing passion for music, meant that by the age of sixteen, he hovered somewhere between a respected concert pianist and glorified sideshow freak. For the following forty years, he toured the length and breadth of North America, soaking up the sounds of the Civil War and Gilded Age, then baffling audiences with his astonishing gifts.

This WordStage presentation with bring this extraordinary artist to life through his music, biographical highlights and from excerpts from the many observations made about him by everyone from anonymous audience members at his concerts to authors Mark Twain and Willa Cather.