Roger Dickerson (born 1934) graduated with honors with a B.A. from Dillard University (1955), and a M.M. from Indiana University where he studied with Bernhard Heiden. Fulbright Fellowships in 1959 and 1960 allowed him to study composition with Karl Schiske and Alfred Uhl at the Akademe fur Musik and Darstellende Kunst in Vienna. He received a John Hay Whitney Fellowship in 1964 for further compositional studies. He was elected to ASCAP in 1965, and in 1972 he composed a series of concert pieces for young string players on a commission from the Rockefeller Foundation. In 1978 PBS aired an hour-long documetary on the life and works of Dickerson. His compositions include: "Concert Overture for Orchestra," "Essay for Band," "A Music Service for Louis: A Requiem for Louis Armstrong," "New Orleans Concerto," "Sonata for Clarinet and Piano," and "Quintet for Wind Instruments."

Source: Perkins Holly, Ellistine. Biographies of Black Composers and Songwriters; A Supplementary Textbook. Iowa:Wm. C. Brown Publishers, 1990.

Music I Heard (C. Aiken), for soprano & piano (1956)

The Negro Speaks of Rivers (L. Hughes), for soprano & piano (1961)

Beyond Silence (Dickerson), for soprano, baritone, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, timpani & organ (1986)