Vote 100: Celebrating Women Composers

To a rousing rendition of Ethel Smyth’s The March of the Women, the evening headed off into a true celebration of great music, overlooked compositions relegated to the archives merely because of gender prejudice. Not this time! In an incredibly curated and compiled programme of works Norman Jacobs of MOOT (Music Of Our Time) and his team have put together an evening of pure delight, from the charming period simplicity of Norah Blaney’s Mister Bear to the exhilarating fun of Lucy Pankhurst’s Lead On, a work for eight hands that had us on the edges of our seats. Along the way we heard musical voices old and new from performers both young and not so young.

Caroline Lucas MP’s stirring introduction was all that was needed to frame the event and the simplicity of moving from work to work without words surely emphasised the truth that no further explanations were required to enforce that fact these pieces are of real musical merit and not fascinating oddities. Congratulations must also go to the large cast of fine musicians of all ages who made the evening whole.

In this anniversary year this was a concert that deserved a much larger venue and audience, gathering to celebrate creativity at its very best. Undoubtedly this was a massive undertaking, not without expense, but the response of the appreciative audience one has to hope goes some way to doing two things, firstly rewarding the producer and performers but perhaps more importantly revealing this untapped and ignored world of music created by women.

St George’s

17 November

Andrew Kay

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