Cook is probably best known for his popular songs and landmark Broadway musicals, featuring African-American creators, producers, and casts, such as Clorindy, or The Origin of the Cake Walk (1898) and In Dahomey (1903).

The senior Cook had been in the first class of the Howard University School of Law, graduating in 1871 and becoming one of the first black lawyers to practice in Washington.

[11][12][13] Will Mercer Cook became a professor of history at Howard University and later was appointed as United States Ambassador to Niger and Senegal.

[14][15] During 1894 and 1895, Cook studied with Czech composer Antonin Dvořák, who was working in the United States for a period, and John White at the National Conservatory of Music.

Cook aimed to showcase this work at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, an event that became famous for its cultural and technological exhibitions.

Despite this setback, the idea of Uncle Tom's Cabin as an opera remains an important chapter in the history of American music and its intersection with social issues.

He gained a production in 1898 of his Clorindy: The Origin of the Cakewalk, a one-act musical comedy created in collaboration with poet Paul Laurence Dunbar.

The Cakewalk, a dance originating from enslaved African Americans as a satirical mimicry of European ballroom styles, became a central feature of Cook's work on In Dahomey[18].

[20] After this period, Cook served as composer-in-chief and musical director for the George Walker-Bert Williams Company, an African-American agency started by two top vaudeville comedians who had been performing together for a decade.

[21] Theatre historian Gerald Bordman says that this is "the first full-length musical written and played by blacks to be performed at a major Broadway house.

Will Marion Cook's profound influence on modern education is examined by Daphne Brooks work, Bodies in Dissent.

Cook's artistic innovations blending African American musical traditions with European classical forms, offer educators a rich lens through which to explore themes of cultural resistance.

Brook emphasizes how Cook's achievements, such as his work on In Dahomey, challenge students to rethink the historical narrative of American theater and music, recognizing the pivotal role of Black artistry in shaping these fields.

His insistence on presenting authentic Black experiences and rejecting stereotypes provides a powerful case study in using arts as a tool for social commentary.