# Women composers!



## WKMT London (Jan 12, 2018)

At WKMT; the school I work at, a colleague has released a wonderful article about women in music.

It basically talks about some outstanding female musicians who have overcome the test of time.

If you are interested in reading about them please check the article
https://www.piano-composer-teacher-london.co.uk/post/the-ten-women-composers-that-we-might-have-forgotten-or-never-knew-about

Let us know if you know about anyone else that should deserve a mention


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

A good, but very selective list. Just off the top of my head, how about Amy Beach, Grazyna Bacewicz, Elizabeth Maconchy, Vítězslava Kaprálová, Dora Pejacevic, Sofia Gubaidulina, Galina Ustvolskaya, Louise Farrenc, Germaine Tailleferre, Elisabetta Brusa, just to name a further ten who deserve greater exposure....


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## AeolianStrains (Apr 4, 2018)

+1 especially for Louise Farrenc and Dora Pejacevic, both of whom are very underrated and hold up very well. We can also add Fanny Mendelssohn, Emilie Mayer, Luise Adolpha le Beau, not to mention the latter's teacher Clara Schumann, though Schumann and Mendelssohn are perhaps too well known to be added to such a list.


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## Taggart (Feb 14, 2013)

We can add Ruth Crawford Seeger, Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, Barbara Strozzi, Isabella Leonarda as an example of the many nuns composing church music in the 17th and 18th centuries.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Hildegard von Bingen is a remarkable oversight. Of recent composers, Unsuk Chin should be mentioned.


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## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

WKMT London said:


> At WKMT; the school I work at, a colleague has released a wonderful article about women in music.
> 
> It basically talks about some outstanding female musicians who have overcome the test of time.
> 
> ...


Look O.P there are some threads already about this subject.

https://www.talkclassical.com/9857-women-composers.html?highlight=women+composer

https://www.talkclassical.com/26111-why-there-few-women.html?highlight=women+composer


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## Globalti (Feb 18, 2020)

Dorothy Howells, 1898 -1982. Born in the Black Country. Wrote the Missa Simplex we used to perform as choirboys at prep school in Malvern.


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## Globalti (Feb 18, 2020)

Dorothy Howell, 1898 - 1982. Wrote the Missa Simplex that I loved singing at prep school in Malvern.


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## Enthusiast (Mar 5, 2016)

CnC Bartok said:


> A good, but very selective list. Just off the top of my head, how about Amy Beach, Grazyna Bacewicz, Elizabeth Maconchy, Vítězslava Kaprálová, Dora Pejacevic, Sofia Gubaidulina, Galina Ustvolskaya, Louise Farrenc, Germaine Tailleferre, Elisabetta Brusa, just to name a further ten who deserve greater exposure....


I agree with many of those ... and Kaija Saariaho should also be there.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

I've heard of all the composers listed and heard their music. However, I've never located/heard a piece of music by any of them I would have purchased on CD or download for repeat listening at home. I have done so with other women composers however:

Ethyl Smyth, an Englishwoman and devoted Brahmsian, wrote very Brahms-ish music including her Concerto for Violin, Horn and Orchestra from 1927. I have two recordings of it.

In America, Jennifer Higdon is as well-known and popular as any female composer. She wrote a violin concerto among many others. She has a significant discography on Naxos.

I have heard some Fanny Mendelssohn I enjoyed but not well enough to but it and retain it at home. As to the others ... pffft.


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

larold said:


> I've heard of all the composers listed and heard their music. However, I've never located/heard a piece of music by any of them I would have purchased on CD or download for repeat listening at home. I have done so with other women composers however:
> 
> Ethyl Smyth, an Englishwoman and devoted Brahmsian, wrote very Brahms-ish music including her Concerto for Violin, Horn and Orchestra from 1927. I have two recordings of it.
> 
> ...


I'd love to click the "dislike" button on the above posting, but it doesn't exist yet.


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## Simon Moon (Oct 10, 2013)

Why, WHY, does Joan Tower get such short shrift?

Other great female composers:

Thea Musgrave, Jennifer Higdon, Augusta Read Thomas, Sofia Gubaidulina, Ruth Crawford Seeger, and many more.


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## haydnguy (Oct 13, 2008)

Art Rock said:


> Hildegard von Bingen is a remarkable oversight. Of recent composers, Unsuk Chin should be mentioned.


Absolutely Hildegard von Bingen should be on the list. As you say, a remarkable oversight.


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## Duncan (Feb 8, 2019)

Representing Canada...

Ana Sokolovic

Jocelyn Morlock

Kelly-Marie Murphy

Alexina Louie

Jean Coulthard

Ann Southam

Nicole Lizée


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Julia Wolfe
Caroline Shaw
Meredith Monk
Libby Larsen
Anna Thorvaldsdottir
Judith Weir
Sally Beamish
Kate Moore
Lera Auerbach
Gabriela Lena Frank
Missy Mazzoli
Dobrinka Tabakova
Lois V Vierk

Hildur Gudnadottir just won an Oscar, by the way, only the fourth female composer to do so.


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## pianozach (May 21, 2018)

Perhaps the two threads specifically titles Women composers could be merged?

I've been asked to present a chamber program in June highlighting some female composers [which brings up a question in my mind: Should the proper terminology be "female composers" or should it be "women composers"?)

Of course, my first question, upon being asked, was to inquire why they wouldn't seek out a female pianist instead. I was told that the gender of the musicians is not relevant. OK . . .

They were thinking piano sonatas, works for violin and piano, cello and piano, and a piano trio.

Funny, but it wasn't that long ago I was trying to play the *"Name more than three female composers"* game (after a discussion of female conductors, which came up after a discussion of how many conductors and composers of color we could name).

Naturally, I could count the number of female classical composers I could recall on the fingers of one hand, and still have fingers left over.

So, after a couple of weeks of back and forth about how to get scores and audio files delivered, and negotiations on how to handle payment (especially given the current situation here in California with a bill called "*AB5*" that was passed to keep Lyft and Uber drivers from being taken advantage of by their "employers", but ends up affecting all contractors, including musicians that "gig".), we're looking at a June performance date, with a possible recording of the concert, or later, in a studio.

I just received the first real idea of what composers and pieces they were thinking of . . .

_"Here are suggestions from which to choose 4 or 5 pieces for piano solo, violin & piano, cello and piano, and piano trio. If you don't find a cellist, we'll reconsider. If you're not enthusiastic about any of the suggested pieces in a particular category, I can suggest others. These are all 19th-century composers writing in the Romantic style of that time . . .

*PIANO SOLO*

*Maria Szymanowska*'s *Nocturne in Bb Major* might be a great opening piece for solo piano.

Along with the Szymanowska Nocturne, rather than a sonata, you could add a couple of character pieces or etudes by *Fanny Mendelssohn, Clara Schumann* or *Cecile Chaminade*.

*Luisa Adolpha Le Beau
Piano Sonata* op. 8

*Cecile Chaminade
Piano Sonata in C Minor* op. 21
This is a difficult piece & an exciting one.

*CELLO & PIANO*

*Clara Faisst
Adagio consonante*

*Clara Schumann
Piano Concerto in A Minor, 2nd movement*
This incredibly innovative concerto has a second movement Romanze scored for solo piano & solo cello. The rest of the orchestra sits & watches them play. It's not performed often enough, & I think excerpting the movement makes total sense. Better to hear it by itself than not at all. It's a very romantic love duet.
But it's linked to the 3rd movement so we might need to write a cadence to end it.

*VIOLIN & PIANO*

*Emilie Mayer
Violin Sonata in E Minor* op. 19

*Emilie Mayer
Violin Sonata in A Minor* op. 18

*Clara Faisst
Violin Sonata in G Major* op. 14
This piece hasn't been recorded. I'm very curious about it. But if the other violin sonatas are better, then play one of them.

*PIANO TRIO*

There are numerous great ones, but one stand-out:

*Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel
Piano Trio in D Minor*_"

Of the above listed female composers, I can honestly say I've heard only of Clara Schumann.

Granted, I'm a pretty good pianist, but after being raised on classical, I spent most of my time after college playing some opera, rock, pop, and an incredible amount of musical theatre. My services in this respect are always in demand, and my various assorted 'gigs' have me playing from morning to night 3/4 of the year. HOWEVER, as a CLASSICAL pianist, I'm say I'm an very good amateur. _[Know your strengths. Know your weaknesses.]_

Of the above listed female composers, I can honestly say I've heard only of Clara Schumann.

*Anyone have any wisdom they'd care to impart?*


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## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

One of my favourite composers.


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## HenryPenfold (Apr 29, 2018)

An excellent contemporary composer. A regular at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (hcmf).


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## Lilijana (Dec 17, 2019)

Radigue and Saunders are both excellent.

One of the best recordings that was released last year is from HCMF featuring a number of some of my favourite composers. Link for details/purchase here:


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## Josquin13 (Nov 7, 2017)

Charlotte Bray: 



Augusta Reade Thomas: 



Libby Larsen:



Rebecca Clarke:



Kaija Saariaho: 




Like others, I'm surprised they left Hildegard von Bingen off the list--that's a very odd oversight: https://www.talkclassical.com/64804-women-composers-2.html#post1778077. Plus, I've also never seen Nadia Boulanger spoken of as a composer ahead of her sister, Lili, but then I don't know Nadia Boulanger's compositions.


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## AeolianStrains (Apr 4, 2018)

There's also Augusta Holmès who I don't think has been mentioned in a while.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

"Maria Szymanowska (1789 - 1831), Nocturne in B flat Major

Performed by Roberto Piana

Maria Szymanowska was born Marianna Agata Wołowska in Warsaw on December 14, 1789 to a Jewish Frankist family. She was a Polish composer and one of the first professional virtuoso pianists of the 19th century. She toured throughout Europe, before settling permanently in St. Petersburg and continued to compose for the Court, gave concerts, taught music.

Her compositions were largely piano pieces, songs, and other small chamber works. In addition were also the first piano concert etudes and nocturnes in the brilliant style reminiscent of the era before Chopin.

Her performances were widely acclaimed by audiences and critics everywhere. She garnered a reputation for having a delicate tone and lyrical sense of virtuosity. She was one of the first professional piano virtuosos in 19th-century Europe. After years of touring, she returned to Warsaw and remained for some time before relocating in early 1828 to St. Petersburg, where she was appointed court pianist to the tsarina.

Her work is categorized as part of the pre-romantic period of Polish Sentimentalism. Like other women composers of her era, she wrote music largely for the instrumentation she had access to, such as solo piano pieces and miniatures, songs, and some chamber works.

Sławomir Dobrzański describes her playing and its historical significance as follows:

"Her Etudes and Preludes show innovative keyboard writing; the Nocturne in B flat is her most mature piano composition; Szymanowska's Mazurkas represent one of the first attempts at stylization of the dance; Fantasy and Caprice contain an impressive vocabulary of pianistic technique; her polonaises follow the tradition of polonaise-writing created by Michal Kleofas Ogiński. Szymanowska's musical style is parallel to the compositional starting point of Frederic Chopin; many of her compositions had an obvious impact on Chopin's mature musical language."

Although scholars have debated the extent of her influence on her compatriot Chopin, her career as a pianist and composer strikingly foreshadows his own as well as the broader trend in 19th-century Europe."


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## pianozach (May 21, 2018)

hammeredklavier said:


> "Maria Szymanowska (1789 - 1831), Nocturne in B flat Major
> 
> Performed by Roberto Piana
> 
> ...


Very nice. Looks to be very playable (for me, that is). Very much like Chopin indeed.

I've already printed out the score (which is identical to the one in the video). I'll see if I can find some time to "test drive" it tomorrow.


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## Pat Fairlea (Dec 9, 2015)

It's a good thread and useful to see just how many notable women composers there are/have been. By all means let's emphasise the importance of Beach, Maconchy, Weir, but beware of elevating the reputation of women composers for no reason other than their gender.
For example, I recently heard part of the Symphony in C-Minor by Alice Mary Smith (1839-1884) played on the radio and commended to the listeners: "Thought to be the first symphony ever written by a woman!". Well yes, but it's bland, unimaginative and derivative. Real gender equality requires that we admit that women could write feeble, uninteresting music just as well as men.


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## pianozach (May 21, 2018)

Pat Fairlea said:


> It's a good thread and useful to see just how many notable women composers there are/have been. By all means let's emphasise the importance of Beach, Maconchy, Weir, but beware of elevating the reputation of women composers for no reason other than their gender.
> For example, I recently heard part of the Symphony in C-Minor by Alice Mary Smith (1839-1884) played on the radio and commended to the listeners: "Thought to be the first symphony ever written by a woman!". Well yes, but it's bland, unimaginative and derivative. Real gender equality requires that we admit that women could write feeble, uninteresting music just as well as men.


Agreed. It SHOULD go without saying, but it needs to be in the backs of our minds.

June 27. That's the date I've been given for this little concert. I hope I'm woman enough for the job.

I'll have to ask my favorite violinist if they know any cellists. Or the local Musical Theatre contractor.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

*Sarah Cahill: The Future is Female, Vol. 2, The Dance (First Hand Records)*

THE FUTURE is FEMALE is a three volume series, which celebrates and highlights women composers from the 17th century to the present day. These recordings feature more than 70 compositions by women around the globe and includes many premiere recordings.

Most pianists grow up with the classical canon, which has always excluded women composers as well as composers of colour. It is still standard practise to perform recitals consisting entirely of music written by men. The Future is Female aims to be a corrective towards rebalancing the repertoire. It does not attempt to be exhaustive, in any way, and the three albums in this series represent only a small fraction of the music by women which is waiting to be performed.






Elisabeth JACQUET DE LA GUERRE (1665–1729)
Les Pièces de Clavecin (1687)
Suite No. 1 in D minor
1. I. Prelude
2. IV. Courante II
3. V. Sarabande
4. VIII. Chaconne L'inconstante
5. VI. Gigue

Clara SCHUMANN (1819–1896)
6. Variations, Op. 20 (1853)

Germaine TAILLEFERRE (1892–1983)
Partita (1957)
7. I. Perpetuum Mobile
8. II. Notturno
9. III. Allegramente

Zenobia POWELL PERRY (1908–2004)
10. Rhapsody (1960)

Madeleine DRING (1881–1947)
Colour Suite (1963)
11. IV. Blue Air
12. V. Brown Study

Betsy JOLAS (b. 1926)
13. Tango SI (1984)

Elena KATS-CHERNIN (b. 1957)
14. Peggy’s Rag (1996)

Meredith MONK (b. 1942)
15. St. Petersburg Waltz (1997)

Gabriela ORTIZ (b. 1964)
Preludio y Estudio No. 3 (2011)
16. Prelude
17. Estudio

Theresa WONG (b. 1976)
18. She Dances Naked Under Palm Trees (2019)
Premiere recording

Recording venue: St. Stephen’s Church, Belvedere, California, 15–28 August 2021
Produced and recorded by Matt Carr


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

*Éliane Radigue and Frédéric Blondy—Occam XXV*






At age 90, Éliane Radigue continues to create astonishing long-form compositions which slow down the passage of time. Commissioned by the Organ Reframed festival, the 45-minute Occam XXV is the first work the electronic composer has written for organ, performed by Frédéric Blondy at London’s Union Chapel on a historic instrument built in 1877.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Louise Reichardt, the daughter of Johann Friedrich




www.youtube.com/watch?v=j4WA8ydx0GA&list=OLAK5uy_no6W8w48Agnp4JzM-ydbpYO4FMBWXLo3k


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