It’s an exciting time for women in classical music! Here’s this week’s update!
Jessica Joy Harned has recently released her theatrical orchestra experience Classical Queens: Our Time, deriving from Harned’s original research project-turned-podcast Classical Queens. Harned describes the show as: “the story of two black women who have become tired of the experiences that they have in classical music, so they travel back in time via a mystical river to learn from their classical music ancestors, Florence Price and Margaret Bonds”—two pivotal musical figures in the Chicago Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 30s. Harned is a 2024 recipient of the “Light of Day” Grant from the Alexa Rose Foundation, a Boise organization that awards grants to artists to help them get their work recognized on a national level. The January 2025 premiere of Our Time will benefit from this project. The show will premiere on Saturday January 11, 2025 at the Morrison Center for the Performing Arts in Boise, ID.
Anne-Marie McDermott, pianist
The Dallas Symphony Orchestra has released a live recording of its 2024 Women in Music Symposium opening concert. The concert featured performances of Amy Beach’s Piano Concerto in C-sharp minor, Op. 45 and Five Arabesques by Alisson Kruusmaa. Pianist Anne-Marie McDermott, artistic director of Bravo! Vail, was the featured soloist, and the orchestra was conducted by Anu Tali. The concert was performed live on November 1st to open the symposium at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas as part of the Texas Instruments Classical Series.
Both the Piano Concerto and the Five Arabesques can be heard on YouTube, courtesy of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra’s Channel.
On December 27 in Pimlico, London, the “Soul of Women” project will present a concert of piano works by women composers at St. Gabriel’s Church in Warwick Square. The concert will include works by: Mel Bonis, Lili and Nadia Boulanger, Cécile Chaminade, Fiona T. Frank, Gaby Kapps, Fanny Mendelssohn, and Clara Schumann. The event is being billed as a reading-concert, with composer Fiona T. Frank narrating as well as playing the violin on her own programmed composition, and pianist-scholar Maggie S. Lorelli sharing her insights into the work of these women with listeners. The concert will begin at 7:30 with free entry and a retiring collection.
Macy Schmidt, conductor
Photo: Em Char Productions
Coming in March 2025, the UK premiere of Barbie The Movie: In Concert™ will take place at the Royal Albert Hall in London. The film will be screened while the score and songs are played live by the BarbieLand™ Sinfonietta—an all-women orchestra. The orchestra will be conducted by Macy Schmidt, who orchestrated the score for the live screening and whose recent work on Kimberly Akimbo made her the first woman-of-color orchestrator in Broadway history. Schmidt is also the Founder/CEO and Music Supervisor for The Broadway Sinfonietta, an acclaimed all-woman orchestra whose majority of members are women of color.
Founded in 2020, The Broadway Sinfonietta is the organization’s first New York City-based ensemble. The organization & production company, The Sinfonietta, has projects and ensembles working across the United States. Their primary work is in collaborating with artists to render popular culture and music in symphonic settings, blending the traditional sounds of the symphony orchestra with film and pop elements. After signing with Sony Masterworks, the Sinfonietta began a second orchestra, the Hollywood Sinfonietta. This LA branch has most recently partnered with Mattel and Warner Bros. Pictures to develop and perform Barbie The Movie: In Concert, performing in the world premiere at the Hollywood Bowl in July 2024. The organization continues to grow and to perform internationally.
Two documentaries featuring women in music are being celebrated as we head into the December holidays. First, composer Jessica Wells has been nominated for Best Screen Composition for her work on the documentary Mozart’s Sister by the Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts. Second, the award-winning film The Only Girl in the Orchestra can now be streamed on Netflix. The film follows the musical life of bassist Orin O’Brien, the first woman to become a full-time member of the New York Philharmonic.
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