This post is the program note I wrote for the first concert of CAIC’s 2020 Collaborative Works Festival, Modern Women, which will be broadcast October 23-25, 2020.

“Women composers continued to persevere as the 20th century ambled along, but misogyny and racist ideas about music stubbornly stuck. The classical music world increasingly worshipped the hallowed canon of repertoire composed by white men it had placed on pedestals that grew higher and higher with each passing decade…”

This post is the program note I wrote for the first concert of CAIC’s 2020 Collaborative Works Festival, Les Parisiennes, which will be broadcast October 16-18, 2020.

“There is no sex in art. Genius is an independent quality...I do not believe that the few women who have achieved greatness in creative work are the exception. But I think that life has been hard on women. It has not given them opportunity. It has not made them convincing. She is handicapped and only the few through force of circumstances or inherent strength have been able to get the better of that handicap...” — CÉCILE CHAMINADE

This post is the program note I wrote for the first concert of CAIC’s 2020 Collaborative Works Festival, Women of the Baroque, which will be broadcast October 9-11, 2020.

…Despite this false narrative, women have been composing music for centuries, relentlessly pushing against the oppressiveness of the musical patriarchy. As we commemorate the centenary of women’s suffrage in the United States through song for this year’s festival, it’s important to acknowledge that this milestone achievement was just one victory in the worldwide centuries’ long struggle for equal rights for women that continues today..