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Books

Out of time and harsh: the historical treatment of the female composer

Anna Beer’s account of female musicians from the ninth century to the present finds them often vilified as loose women or even witches

7 May 2016

9:00 AM

7 May 2016

9:00 AM

Sounds and Sweet Airs: The Forgotten Women of Classical Music Anna Beer

Oneworld, pp.384, £16.99, ISBN: 9781780748566

Just a few weeks ago, Germany’s VAN magazine published an interview with the composer Olga Neuwirth. In it she describes her early career in the 1980s and ’90s — a ‘lone’ female voice in the ‘wilderness’ of classical music. So far, so sadly, so frustratingly predictable. But then she turns to the current situation and things become rather more startling.

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