Women Composers

As early as the 1500s, a surprising number of women have composed classical music. Many were successful, finding venues for both publishing and performing their music; others found the social barriers for women impossible to overcome. This book provides access to these composers, both well known and obscure. Arranged chronologically by era, the profiles are further divided into countries. For each female composer within a country, a brief biographical sketch is provided, as well as a description of her body of work. This text also includes an extensive timeline of operatic works by female composers.

Though rarely included in traditional music history, women have a remarkable tradition as composers of Western music. This book brings together musical and biographical material on twenty-five women, from the eleventh through the twentieth centuries. Each chapter focuses on one composer, providing an introduction to her life, an analysis of her music, a checklist of her works, and a bibliography. Extensive appendices include a historical outline showing female composers in relation to their more famous male contemporaries by period and genre, and suggestions for further readings and recordings.

A companion to the Classic FM series Francesca Caccini. Barbara Strozzi. Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre. Marianna Martines. Fanny Hensel. Clara Schumann. Lili Boulanger. Elizabeth Maconchy. Since the birth of classical music, women who dared compose have faced a bitter struggle to be heard. In spite of this, female composers continued to create, inspire and challenge. Yet even today so much of their work languishes unheard. Anna Beer reveals the highs and lows experienced by eight composers across the centuries, from Renaissance Florence to twentieth-century London, restoring to their rightful place exceptional women whom history has forgotten.

This three-volume series of piano music by women composers is a progressive compendium of educational literature with a broad repertoire from the 17th century to the present day. For each piece, the editor has written short instructions with rehearsal tips as well as biographical notes on the women composers. The collection covers all levels of difficulty from easy (volume 1) to medium (volume 2) to difficult (volume 3) and is an indispensable addition to lessons and concerts.

This is the first full-length study of British women's instrumental chamber music in the early twentieth century. Laura Seddon argues that the Cobbett competitions, instigated by Walter Willson Cobbett in 1905, and the formation of the Society of Women Musicians in 1911 contributed to the explosion of instrumental music written by women in this period and highlighted women's place in British musical society in the years leading up to and during the First World War. Seddon investigates the relationship between Cobbett, the Society of Women Musicians and women composers themselves. The book’s six case studies - of Adela Maddison (1866-1929), Ethel Smyth (1858-1944), Morfydd Owen (1891-1918), Ethel Barns (1880-1948), Alice Verne-Bredt (1868-1958) and Susan Spain-Dunk (1880-1962) - offer valuable insight into the women’s musical education and compositional careers. Seddon’s discussion of their chamber works for differing instrumental combinations includes an exploration of formal procedures, an issue much discussed by contemporary sources. The individual composers' reactions to the debate instigated by the Society of Women Musicians, on the future of women's music, is considered in relation to their lives, careers and the chamber music itself. As the composers in this study were not a cohesive group, creatively or ideologically, the book draws on primary sources, as well as the writings of contemporary commentators, to assess the legacy of the chamber works produced.

This book is the most definitive attempt to date to discuss the achievements of women as composers of experimental and avant-garde music from the 1930s to the present day. Using a wealth of primary material, it also explores currently relevant issues in gender and technology. Drawing out the relationships between composers and their working environments, and between teachers and students, Elizabeth Hinkle-Turner discusses the contribution of women composers to electroacoustic music. The book includes a bibliography and discography covering the work of ninety composers.

First Published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Interspersing consideration of Marga Richter's (born 1926) musical works with discussion of her life, her musical style, and the origins and performances of her works, this book documents a successful composer's professional and private life throughout the twentieth century.