All freedom to the performers – 100 years of women composing new music

This episode of Radio Schallfeld is dedicated to celebrating 100 years of female composers from the dawn of the 20th century until today. For a long time it was not common for women to be accepted as musical creators. As performers, some started worldwide careers, but composing remained a male domain until the feminist movements across the 20th century started to change the role image of „the musical creator“ and allowed for female creativity to be recognized more in public. In this show we follow the paths of women loosely tied in and around the ISCM. Starting with Ethel Smyth, who was one of the initial members, our path leads along the music of Lily Boulanger, Eva Maria Houben, Alyssa Aska and we end up with Anna Korsun, a young Ucrainian composer exploring the edges of music and silence.

This episode is bilingual, because some parts of the introduction were recorded live at a concert on 3. February 2024 at the Volkshaus Graz.

Show playlist:

Ethel Smyth – March of the Women

Lily Boulanger – Trois morceaux pour piano

Eva Maria Houben – a dark place

Eva Maria Houben – gesang nr. iii

Eva Maria Houben – a lonely place

Alyssa Aska – missio

Anna Korsun – Spleen

Host: Margarethe Maierhofer-Lischka

Interview contributions by: Eva Maria Houben & Irene Kurka, Elfriede Reissig

Recording & sound engineering of music tracks: Peter Venus

Thanks to Irene Kurka, host of the podcast „neue musik leben“ for giving permission to use an excerpt of an interview with Eva Maria Houben originally published in „neue musik leben“.