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Anne Gamble Kennedy (25 September 1920 – 11 June 2001) was an American classical pianist, piano professor, and accompanist for the Fisk Jubilee Singers of Nashville, Tennessee.

Early life

Anne Lucile Gamble was born in Charleston, West Virginia to Dr. Henry Floyd Gamble and the former Nina Hortense Clinton. She was the youngest of two children born to that union. She also had two older step-siblings, Katherine Lee Gamble and Henry Floyd Gamble, Jr. One of the first African-American graduates of the Yale Medical School, Henry Gamble had to “pass” for white in order to complete his education. Dr. Gamble was killed when his car was hit by a train in 1932. Anne was eleven years old. Dr. Gamble’s mother had been a slave on the Howard’s Neck Plantation in Goochland County Virginia. His father Henry Harman Gamble was a foreman on the same plantation, and was of Scotch-Irish and Native-American descent. Anne’s mother was an accomplished teacher and was one of the Jubilee Singers at Wilberforce University. While on tour with the Wilberforce Jubilee Singers in London, she witnessed and photographed the coronation of King Edward VII in 1901. Anne Gamble received her early education in the segregated public schools of Charleston. Matriculating at Fisk University in 1937, she graduated cum laude in 1941 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. Her further education included a Bachelor of Music degree from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, with additional study at the Juilliard School of Music, George Peabody College, and artist training with pianist Ray Lev in New York.

Career

Early in her career, Gamble had been engaged to appear as piano soloist with the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra in a performance of Rachmaninoff’s second piano concerto. A few months before the concert, the conductor died suddenly. His replacement was a racist, and cancelled Gamble’s contract. She also auditioned for Duke Ellington while he was in Charleston, who invited her to perform in New York. As a performing artist and teacher, she launched a concert career after serving on the piano faculties of HBCUs Tuskegee Institute and Talladega College. Her career was interrupted when she accepted an invitation extended by Professor John W. Work, III in 1950 to teach piano at Fisk University for one semester. The “one semester” resulted in Anne Gamble’s tenure of thirty-two years. For seventeen of her years at Fisk, she served as accompanist and piano soloist with the Fisk Jubilee Singers under directors John W. Work and Matthew Kennedy, traveling with them throughout the United States, the Bahamas, and Europe, and performing with them on television, radio, and stage throughout Eastern Europe. In 1956 she married Matthew Kennedy. Their daughter is pianist, filmmaker, and orchestral conductor Nina Kennedy. Anne Gamble Kennedy is widely known for her moving performances of her own arrangement of Albert Malotte’s “The Lord’s Prayer.” She participated in many community activities including: The Women’s Advisory Committee of the Tennessee Performing Arts Foundation; music consultant for the Fine Arts Committee of the Nashville Chamber of Commerce; member of “The Outing” Committee, Nashville Symphony Benefit; Vice President of the John W. Work, III Memorial Foundation; the Nashville Chapter of Links, Inc.; and a Life Member of the NAACP.

Selected discography

Malagueña, by Ernesto Lecuona, 1939

The Fisk Jubilee Singers Live in Rome, 1956