Carlos Simon Lead Composer Jongnic Bontemps Composer Kathryn Bostic Composer Nathalie Joachim Composer Allison Loggins-Hull Composer Levi Taylor Composer
Artistic advisor
Jacksonville was once a cornerstone of Black cinema during the silent film era. In 1926, our city’s Norman Studios became the first U.S. studio dedicated to portraying African Americans in leading roles with dignity and heroism. Advertised as “the greatest airplane thriller ever filmed,” The Flying Ace became a landmark of early American filmmaking and is the studio’s only surviving feature-length film.
Now, 100 years later, that history takes flight when the Jacksonville Symphony brings the film vividly to life with the world premiere of a newly commissioned orchestral score. Written collaboratively by six of today’s leading composers and performed live alongside a screening of the original film, the music unfolds in real time—reimagining a silent classic with the full power, color and emotional range of a modern symphony orchestra.
Filmed in Jacksonville’s historic Old Arlington neighborhood and in nearby Mayport, The Flying Ace stars Laurence Criner as Capt. Billy Stokes, a decorated World War I pilot, who returns home to resume his work as a railroad detective. When a payroll agent disappears along with a satchel containing $25,000, Stokes must solve the mystery and rescue the heroine, Ruth Sawtelle, played by Kathryn Boyd, in a dramatic aviation showdown. The film’s story was inspired in part by aviation pioneer Bessie Coleman, the first Black woman to earn a pilot’s license in the United States, who tragically died in a 1926 plane crash in Jacksonville.
A century after it first took flight in Jacksonville, the Symphony gives The Flying Ace a powerful new voice.
This is more than a film screening. More than a concert. It is a once-in-a-century cultural event—honoring Jacksonville’s artistic legacy while creating something entirely new for our community and the national stage.
