help me, lazyweb

[jwgh]

I happened across a conversation (which, believe me, you do not want to read) which brought out the old chestnut, "Where are the female Beethovens?"

Now, I seem to remember that at some point someone (spurred by this sort of question) had a look back and discovered that there were actually a number of great female composers at the time; they were just mostly ignored at the time and continue to largely be ignored today. Unfortunately, I can't seem to find anything about this online, but I'm pretty sure I didn't imagine it. Does anyone else have any idea what I'm talking about?

(Another response is along the lines of Virginia Woolf's essay on Shakespeare's sister, but that's not what I'm thinking of.)

Comments

[dawn-guy.livejournal.com]

This commentary (http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm?aid=3196) and this article (http://www.nj.com/music/ledger/index.ssf?/base/entertainment-1/118067468325610.xml&coll=1) talk frankly about the gender disparity in classical music performance.

[jwgh]

Thanks!

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

I studied that question somewhat in college (Smith, go figure) but most of the resources I'm familiar with are books such as the Norton Dictionary of Women Composers.

There's the Kapralova Society's Women Composers database, though you can't sort by date. The same site provides a bibliography.

This article appears to be too recent to be the one you're thinking of, but it's about what you're asking, and some digging around in the links off this article and a bit of Googling on classical women composers turned up many, many someones examining this very question.

[jwgh]

Thanks. As you say, I don't think that's the article I was thinking of, but it certainly covers the topic nicely.

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

You're very welcome.

And, you're right: I didn't want to read that. Good god.

[jwgh]

Normally I try to link back to what I'm talking about, but I didn't think it was worth depressing my entire friendslist.

[paperclippy.livejournal.com]

I know there were some famous women but the only one coming to mind is Clara Schumann.

Carl Maria von Weber and Camille Saint-Saens: NOT GURLS

[pootrootbeer.livejournal.com]

She's the only one I remember learning anything about in my college Music program, and given the amount of Susan McClary we were assigned to read, I'm actually surprised there weren't others presented as well.

[fuziekat.livejournal.com]

Check out Amy Beach and Fanny Mendelssohn. There were more women composers starting in the Romantic era when playing the piano became a desirable trait for young ladies, but these two have interesting bios of struggling to be recognized as women composers in their time.