“With the presentation of Kaija Saariaho’s ‘L’Amour de Loin’ this month, the Metropolitan Opera finally broke a 113-year streak of not performing any operas written by women,” writes William Robin in Thursday’s (12/15) New York Times. “It remains a difficult landscape for female composers, but there are institutions that advocate for them.” The article reports on programs for women composers from the League of American Orchestras, Opera America, Luna Composition Lab, and Prototype: Opera/Theatre/Now. “The League of American Orchestras has devised an initiative to support female composers … funded by the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation. In partnership with the EarShot project of the American Composers Orchestra—which itself has featured the music of more than 100 women composers over the past 15 years—the League’s Women Composers Readings and Commissions Program has since 2014 sponsored orchestral opportunities for women in the early stages of their compositional careers. Last month, the New York Philharmonic performed one of the resulting commissions, Julia Adolphe’s viola concerto ‘Unearth, Release.’ And this week, the League announced that the program would be renewed until 2017, and that it had expanded to include commissions for three composers: Chen-Hui Jen, Wang Jie and Hannah Lash.” For more on the League’s program for women composers, click here.
Posted December 15, 2016
