Classical Music Moonlighters

The Guardian has a great piece up highlighting “Classical Music Moonlighters”. The list of composers who worked on music after they finished their day jobs includes: Ethel Smyth (who was a composer first and turned to writing books – including a...
Hildegard gets Top Billing at Musicology Conference

Hildegard gets Top Billing at Musicology Conference

The American Musicological Society (together with the Society for Music Theory) is holding its annual conference next week in Milwaukee, WI.  We are happy to note that the AMS President’s Endowed Plenary Lecture (Nov. 6) is a fascinating report on an interdisciplinary...
Hildegard’s Feast Day

Hildegard’s Feast Day

Today is the Feast day of one of the best known women composers – and, typically, the only one to be included in a music history textbook – is Hildegard of Bingen. A 12th century abbess in Germany, Hildegard is remembered for being one of the first women...

NPR’s “Biggest Badass Composers”

NPR’s Deceptive Cadence picked up on a twitter feed recently questioning which composer is the “biggest badass”, with qualifications to include drugs, sex, guts and politics. The list of composers included (surprise!!!) no women. Though the list, which was compiled...

2011 Proms Season

The BBC Proms, founded in 1895 by Henry Wood, have always been designed to invite and encourage the masses to engage with a wide variety of music.  Though the inclusion of women in the yearly Proms programming has not always been a priority for the organizers, there...