Are you interested in contextual issues related to the life stories and the music of Black composers? Try some of the following resources for ideas.
Musical Landscapes in Color by 
Black Opera: History, Power, Engagement by 
The Music of Black Americans: A History by 
Music in the USA by 
Black Musical Theatre by Here's a selection of online resources that may inspire your research, pique your interest, or lead you to another research topic.
To mark Black History Month in February 2021, the Library of Congress published this blog, which includes links to three research guides to collections in the Library's holdings. Highlighted in these guides are African-American composer, arranger, and singer Harry Thacker Burleigh, the work of Dr. Samuel Floyd on Early African-American Music, and a guide to Black Composers in Music Division Collections.
The website of the National Museum of African American Music in Nashville is dedicated to preserving and celebrating the history of Black music in America.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has curated a physical exhibit with an accompanying virtual walk-through called It's Been Said All Along: Voices of Rage, Hope and Empowerment. This virtual exhibit includes narration, images from the exhibit at the Hall of Fame, and excerpts from musical selections of many genres that are pertinent to the topics of social justice and equality.
Indiana University houses the Archives of African American Music and Culture, which covers a wide range of musical genres and social issues, mostly post-dating World War II. The Archives also includes a link to Black Grooves, a collection of reviews of new music releases. Notable online offerings include AAAMC's Classical composers and History of Black Radio collections.
The African Diaspora Music Project sponsors a searchable database of classical music scores, recordings, and programmatic information about works written by composers of Central and West African Heritage. The database currently houses information on art songs, but the Project plans to expand to other musical forms.
The Expanding the Music Theory Canon website provides illustrative materials to support instruction of undergraduate scholars in core Western music theory. All examples are written by composers who are women, Black, Indigenous, or People of Color (BIPOC). Each example includes a musical excerpt to illustrate the theory concept being taught; a public-domain link to the full score of the work from which the excerpt came; when available, a public-domain link to a recording of the work; and a link to a biography of the composer.
A Seat at the Piano, the African American Art Song Alliance, and the Black Opera Research Network each serve as a platform to encourage communication and collaboration among musicians and composers and to promote inclusion in piano, art song repertoire, and opera respectively. Each website includes lists of recommended works.
Similarly, the Chamber Music America Composers' Equity Project includes a database of resources by and about chamber music composers who identify as female, gender-non-conforming, African/Black, Latinx, Asian/South Asian, Arab/Middle Eastern, or Native American.
The HistoryMakers Digital Archive includes video oral history interviews with over 2,000 Black Americans of historical significance. Among these interviews are recollections of, references to, and interviews with notable Black composers.
Darren Scott Rumsey has created a website called No Broken Links, which includes instrument-specific directories of solo and chamber repertoire written by underrepresented composers. The website currently includes repertoire directories for flute, oboe, and clarinet, with plans to add directories of repertoire for bassoon, horn, and saxophone.
