A concert in New York City, Feb. 28, Winds of Change, Songs of Time is a concert celebrating the enduring musical legacy of women composers associated with the National League of American Pen Women. Organized as a journey through the four seasons, the program highlights works for voice, piano, strings, and chamber ensemble, spanning lyrical art song, instrumental miniatures, and chamber music.
This concert reflects The Gena Branscombe Project’s mission to bring overlooked women composers into the spotlight while creating performance opportunities for today’s musicians. Proceeds support their publishing, performance, and scholarship initiatives.
The remarkable photo advertising the concert is from a 1924 concert of composers of the League of American PEN Women (LAPW), the photo was discovered “hidden in plain sight” in 2018. PEN was founded in 1921 in London to defend and celebrate free expression of writers and other creators. The American branch was founded the following year. Describing the 1924 concert, the Washington Post observed in surprise: “this concert will mark something new in recitals as it will be the first in which more than one American woman composer has appeared on one recital program.” These organizations encouraged women to work together to bring their music to audiences and the wider public, an often-controversial goal women in an era when women’s sphere was still generally restricted to the domestic.
The concert will be repeated in Boston at the New England Conservatory on March 16. Tickets for the Feb. 28 concert are here. The performers feature: Jessica Arielle Bloch, soprano’ Nelson Ojeda Valdés, Piano; Julian Gau, Piano; Kelsey Philbrick, violin; and David Newtown, cello.
Left to right: PEN women composers Phyllis Fergus, Ethel Glenn Hier, Amy Beach, Harriet Ware, and Gena Branscombe. McPherson Square, Washington, DC, 23 April 1924. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress