Introduction

Biography

Edward was the son of min­is­ter Da­ni­el Web­ster Boat­ner.

He was edu­cat­ed at West­ern Uni­ver­si­ty, Quin­da­ro, Kan­sas City, Kan­sas; the Bos­ton Con­ser­va­to­ry; and Chi­ca­go Mu­sic Col­lege (now the Col­lege of Per­form­ing Arts at Roo­se­velt Uni­ver­si­ty). He al­so stu­died mu­sic pri­vate­ly.

He be­gan as a con­cert sing­er with the en­cour­age­ment and as­sist­ance of Ro­land Hayes—who per­formed ma­ny of Boat­ner’s works on his con­cert pro­grams—and cho­ral di­rect­or R. Na­than­iel Dett.

He sang lead­ing roles with the Na­tion­al Ne­gro Op­era Com­pa­ny, and was mu­sic di­rect­or of the Na­tion­al Bap­tist Con­ven­tion (1925–31).

Boatner was a pro­fess­or at Sam­uel Hus­ton Col­lege (now Hus­ton-Til­lot­son Uni­ver­si­ty) and Wi­ley Col­lege in Mar­shall, Tex­as.

He then set­tled in New York, com­pos­ing, con­duct­ing a stu­dio and di­rect­ing com­mu­ni­ty and church choirs.