Born in the French Quarter of New Orleans, Camille Knickerson’s musical interests and abilities were evinced early by her father, William Joseph Knickerson, who was a music professor and band director at Southern University in New Orleans. Trained at Oberlin College Conservatory, the Juilliard School, and Columbia Teachers College, Knickerson established the B-sharp Music Club to promote “Negro Music,” and founded a branch of the National Association of Negro Musicians (NANM) in 1921.

Knickerson’s research and performance forte focused on Creole songs, and she arranged many for concert performance. Her work won her a coveted Rosenwald Fellowship at Oberlin College, and her Master’s thesis was “Afro-Creole Music in Louisiana: A Thesis on the Plantation Songs Created by the Creole Negroes of Louisiana.” As early as 1942, her work was published by the Boston Music Company in a volume entitled Five Creole Songs harmonized and arranged by Camille Knickerson. Her arrangements of Creole songs are fine examples of folk music transcription.

A professor on the faculty of Howard University, Knickerson had a lasting impact on the musical community, as can be seen in the numerous archival repositories that cite her scholarly work including The Marian Anderson Collection (University of Pennsylvania), Louise Burge Papers (Howard University), Eva Jessye Collection (Pittsburgh State University), Ray M. Lawless Collection (Library of Congress), and the National Negro Opera Company Collection (Library of Congress).