Our Winter set builds on last season’s commitment to presenting lesser heard works by women composers. Mélanie Bonis just missed studying at the Paris Conservatoire under Fauré. Like so many talented women, her parents discouraged her studies, forcing her to drop out as soon as she became engaged. It wasn’t until 1891 that she was recognized via a musical competition, one that she entered under the name M. Bonis. The jury awarded her first prize, initially mistaking her for a man! Bonis was a gifted composer of songs, and her Piano Quartet in Bb Major, Op.69 is a wonderful example of her feel for melody and atmosphere.
Dame Ethel Smyth, like Bonis born in 1858, led a very different life from her French contemporary. She was an avid member of the woman’s suffrage movement. Despite suffering the same bigotry toward her work that plagued other female composers – her father was very much opposed to her work as a composer – she became the first female composer to be granted a damehood. Her ambitious String Trio, like so much of her chamber music, has only recently been resurrected.