SBCC Poster advertising its Women Composers Concert.
Lots of exciting news this week!
On May 4th, the Santa Barbara City College presented its women composers concert at the Garvin Theater on the SBCC campus. The program selections were an enviable combination of classic/historical composers and contemporary ones—all women, naturally. The contemporaries included: Lucy Simon’s “How Could I Ever Know?” from The Secret Garden, Mary Howe’s Stars, Emma Lou Diemer’s Festival Overture, Beverly Van Wingerden’s Dead Man Walking, and the premiere of SBCC music major Sally Ghizzoni’s One Steppe. These were joined by some classic pieces by women well-known to the readers of Women’s Philharmonic Advocacy: Augusta Holmès’ Night and Love (La Nuit et l’amour), Lili Boulanger’s Nocturne (in an orchestration by Cody Anderson) and Welsh composer Grace Williams’s Fantasia on Welsh Nursery Tunes.
The program on its own is already aspirational—we should be so lucky to see and hear women composers programmed and performed in such variety. Santa Barbara, however, seems to be fertile ground for women in music to present their work. The Santa Barbara Music Club (previously a private women’s club, and now a nine-month series of classical music concerts) and the Santa Barbara Chamber Music Society both also regularly promote works by women composers, from chamber music to works for larger forces. The SBCC Orchestra, therefore, is well-positioned to present concerts like this to an enthusiastic audience.
Composers Jennifer Higdon, Caroline Shaw, Teresa Carreño, and Katy Abbott
On May 16th, the Plano Symphony Orchestra will present its latest concert in its Women Composer Series at Christ United Methodist Church in Plano, TX. The event was partly funded by a grant from the City of Plano. This concert will feature works for string orchestra by four women composers: Caroline Shaw’s Entr’acte for String Orchestra (2011), Teresa Carreño’s Serenade for String Orchestra (1895), Jennifer Higdon’s Dance Card (2015), and Katy Abbott’s Glacial Thunder (2024). The orchestra will play under the direction of Alexandra Kovatch. The program has been chosen to show four women composers doing groundbreaking work, each shaping the landscape of classical music through her unique voice.
The performance promises to be a knockout event! Shaw and Higdon are both award-winners: Shaw won a Pulitzer in 2013 for her Partita for 8 Voices; Higdon received the 2010 Pulitzer for her Violin Concerto and also won 3 Grammy awards for Contemporary Classical Composition, for her Percussion Concerto (2009), her Viola Concerto (2017), and her Harp Concerto (2019). Abbott’s work was commissioned by the Melbourne Chamber Orchestra, and they performed the premiere in February 2024.
The International La Maestra conducting competition is currently taking applications (March 8 – July 8, 2025) for participants in its fourth competition, organized by the Paris Mozart Orchestra and the Philharmonie de Paris. The competition and academy will be held from 23–28 February, 2026.
Lately, there have been some new appointments in classical music:
- Conductor Marzena Diakun has been named as the next chief conductor of the Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie. She is the first female conductor to be named to this post, and her first season will begin in 2026.
- Composer Katherine Balch has been given a Royal Philharmonic Society Award for Large-Scale Composition for her whisper concerto (for solo cello and orchestra).
- Holly Hyun Choe has been awarded the 2025 Sir Georg Solti Conducting Award by the Solti Foundation (U.S.), and been appointed as the next principal conductor of the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, beginning in 2026. She is the first female conductor to be named to this post.
- Johanna Stoller has been appointed as the next artistic director of the Netherlands Bach Society. She is the first woman to hold the post, and began her initial five-season contract on May 1, 2025.
Below is a performance of Balch’s whisper concerto (2022) for solo cello and orchestra, performed by the BBC Philharmonic in 2024.
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