Born in Harrisburg, PA, Estelle Pinckney lived there with her mother and grandmother while her father was at sea. The family moved to Massachusetts in the early 1870s, eventually setting in Worcester. When her mother died in 1875, she lived with her maternal aunt, a Native American healer. People first noticed her talent as she sang in the church choir, the starting point for many musicians at the time. She performed publicly beginning in the early 1880s, primarily in the Boston and Worcester areas. In 1903 she sang the title role of Aida for the Theodore Drury Opera Company, and was a featured soloist when Samuel Coleridge Taylor conducted his “The Childhood of Hiawatha” in Washington, D.C. She continued to perform on the east coast; her portfolio included roles from Meyerbeer’s L’Africaine, Delibe’s Lakmé, and Mozart’s The Magic Flute. Throughout her career she lived in Worcester, where she married mail carrier Benjamin H. Clough (1889). By the 1920s she retired from active performing and opened her own voice studio in the city. She died in Worcester in 1929 and is buried in Hope Cemetery.

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For further information on this artist:

· “Of Pez, Beaneaters, and a black Aida, Vol. III.” Born and Forgotten in Worcester, May 12, 2019. https://borninworcester.blogspot.com/2019/05/of-pez-beaneaters-and-black-aida-vol-iii.html. Accessed December 14, 2023.

· Caplan, Lucy. “The Improbable Rise of the First African American Opera Impresario.” SF Classical Voice, February 6, 2017. https://www.sfcv.org/articles/feature/improbable-rise-first-african-american-opera-impresario. Accessed December 14, 2023.

· Nash, Elizabeth. Autobiographical Reminiscences of African American Classical Singers, 1853-Present. Edwin Mellon Press, 2007.

· Worcester Historical Museum, January 4, 2021. https://www.facebook.com/worcesterhistory/posts/10157722282741299/. Accessed December 14, 2023.

· Jae Jones: Black Then: Discovering our history: “Estelle Pinckney Clough: Renowned Soprano Singer who Performed Title Role in Verdi’s Aida.” March 28, 2022. https://blackthen.com/estelle-pinckney-clough-renowned-soprano-singer-who-performed-title-role-in-verdis-aida/. Accessed May 5, 2024.