In Celebration of Women Composers

French pianist and composer Cécile Chaminade’s recognition during her lifetime was rare for a woman composer in the 19th-early 20th century. As a child, Chaminade had to turn down an invitation to study at the Paris Conservatory due to her family’s concern over social status and norms. She was allowed to study piano and composition privately, and with determination, she embarked on a performance career of playing her own pieces in salon recitals. Chaminade toured the United States in 1908 and was wildly successful and popular with American audiences. She received many awards and distinctions during her career, including being the first female composer elected a Chevalier of the National Order of the Legion of Honour in 1913.

Her compositions primarily consist of vocal and piano works, plus several larger orchestral and choral compositions. Chaminade described her compositional style as being from the Romantic school, and most of her works feature tuneful melodies with some chromaticism. Unfortunately, Chaminade’s compositions are not as well known to current audiences with the exception of her Concertino, Opus 107 for flute. The Concertino was composed for the 1902 Paris Conservatory Concours and is considered a standard work for flutists. It remains a frequently programmed piece, in its original version for flute and piano, on advanced student recitals and professional concert programs.

Watch the rarely heard version of the timeless Concertino performed by flute soloist Mimi Stillman and the Chamber Orchestra of the Triangle.

Florence Beatrice Price was born in 1887 in Arkansas to a music teacher mother and a dentist father. Her mother nurtured her musical talent, encouraging her studies in music and leading her to attend the New England Conservatory of Music. In 1932, the Rodman Wanamaker Foundation held composition competitions in Chicago, and Price won awards for her works: Symphony No. 1 in e minor and Piano Sonata in e minor. On June 15, 1933, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed Symphony No. 1 in e minor, making her the first African American woman composer to have a symphony premiered by a major American orchestra.

Price’s music integrates the European classical tradition in which she was trained with melodies from African American spirituals and folk tunes. Despite her talent and innovative contributions as a composer, much of her later work was overlooked or ignored by classical music performers and institutions of her time. A discovery in 2009 of unpublished scores and manuscripts by Price has sparked renewed interest in her work.

Watch the fifth movement of Five Folksongs in Counterpoint, Sweet Low, Sweet Chariot, performed by the Apollo Chamber Players to hear how Price used some of the most famous spirituals.

Watch Price’s Symphony No. 1 in e minor performed by The U.S. Army Band “Pershing’s Own.”

French composer, pianist, conductor, and educator Nadia Boulanger began music studies at an early age at the Paris Conservatory. She won the first prize in harmony in 1903 and additional prizes in counterpoint, fugue, and organ. She was among the first women to enter the prestigious Prix de Rome competition, which began accepting submissions from women in 1903. Although her initial instrumental fugue entry created a scandal by going against the requirement of submitting a vocal work, she was subsequently awarded a second prize in 1908.

She undertook numerous tours to the United States and conducted the Boston Symphony in 1938. In 1940, Boulanger emigrated to the US, where she secured teaching positions at the Longy School of Music and the Peabody Institue, instructing students in composition, harmony, orchestration, counterpoint, and music history. She returned to France in 1946 and took a position at the Paris Conservatory. Throughout her lengthy teaching career, Boulanger mentored hundreds of developing composers, including Quincy Jones, Burt Bacharach, Leonard Bernstein, and Aaron Copland. Her compositional output includes songs for piano, chamber and orchestral works, an opera, and a cantata. It’s worth noting that Nadia’s younger sister, Lili Boulanger, was a highly regarded composer and was the first female winner of the Prix de Rome composition prize in 1913. Lili’s untimely death in 1918 at the age of 24 profoundly impacted her sister’s life, prompting Nadia to concentrate on promoting her sister’s compositions over her own. From 1921 to the end of her life, Nadia Boulanger turned her attention to conducting and teaching, becoming one of the most prominent composition teachers of the 20th century.

Watch Nadia Boulanger’s Fantasy for piano and orchestra with soloist French pianist Eric Le Sage.

Watch Lili Boulanger’s D’un matin de Printemps performed by the Seattle Symphony

Groundbreaking composer and educator Ruth Crawford Seeger, born in East Liverpool, Ohio, began piano studies at age 6. She later moved to Chicago to study at the American Conservatory of Music, where she intended to complete only a teaching certificate but started composing in her second year of studies, beginning a lifelong commitment to composing. Seeger earned many awards, including being the first female composer to win the Guggenheim Fellowship. Crawford Seeger used the fellowship prize money to travel to Europe to continue her composing career, where she met resistance to having her works performed and published. She continued to press for performances of her music. Finally, she received recognition in 1933 when her composition, Three Voices for voice, oboe, percussion, and strings, was selected to represent the US at the International Society for Contemporary Music in Amsterdam.

Crawford Seeger moved to Washington, DC in 1933 when her musicologist husband, Charles Seeger, was appointed to the music division of the Resettlement Administration. During her years in the Washington, DC area, she developed an interest in American folk music and devoted more time to creating acclaimed arrangements of folk songs before returning to her earlier modern compositional style with the 1953 Suite for Wind Quintet. While living in Silver Spring, MD, she created an early version of a book of folk songs designed to educate children. She is credited with making music accessible for parents to learn and share with their young children.

Listen to Crawford Seeger’s 1931 String Quartet considered one of the finest modern works of the genre.

Born in New Rochelle, New York, Joan Tower studied composition at Bennington College and earned a doctorate in composition from Columbia University. She made her compositional mark early as a founding member of the New York City-based Da Capo Chamber Players, serving as the pianist and composing many popular works for the group from 1969 to 1984. While in New York City, she worked as a jazz pianist, and many of her works include influences from jazz harmony.

Tower joined the Bard College Conservatory of Music faculty in 1972, where she currently teaches composition and conducting. Her expansive career includes commissions from countless major orchestras, soloists, and ensembles. She was the first woman to win the Grawemeyer Award for her composition Silver Ladders in 1990, and her orchestral work, Made In America, recorded by the Nashville Symphony, won 3 Grammy Awards in 2008. While her early compositional style is rooted in the serialist tradition, she frequently composes for specific ensembles and soloists, and over time, her music has transitioned to a more impressionistic style.

Fanfare for an Uncommon Woman, written between 1987 and 1992, features six parts. Tower dedicated each part to a woman who is adventurous and takes risks. Part 6 is dedicated to Cuban American composer Tania León. Watch Fanfare for an Uncommon Woman part 6 performed by the Baltimore Symphony.

Listen to Made in America performed by the Nashville Symphony.

Jennifer Higdon, born in Brooklyn, NY, developed an interest in flute at age 15 and started formal studies on the instrument at age 18 and composition studies at age 21. She earned degrees at Bowling Green University, the Curtis Institute, and a PhD from the University of Pennsylvania. The League of American Orchestras lists Higdon as one of the most frequently performed contemporary composers, with over 200 performances each year of her compositions. Her orchestral work Blue Cathedral has received over 600 performances since its premiere in 2000.

Higdon’s vast catalog includes works for orchestra, choral, wind band, chamber ensemble, opera, and solo instruments. Her commissions from major orchestras include the Chicago Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, The Cleveland Orchestra, Atlanta Symphony, and prominent chamber groups such as the Tokyo String Quartet. She is a three-time Grammy winner and was awarded the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for her Violin Concerto.

Fanfare Magazine describes her music as having “the distinction of being at once complex, sophisticated but readily accessible emotionally.” The Times of London cites it as “…traditionally rooted yet imbued with integrity and freshness.”

Listen to Higdon’s 2022 composition, Aspire, commissioned and recorded by “The President’s Own” United States Marine Band.

Listen to the Pulitzer Prize winning Violin Concerto dedicated to and performed by Hilary Hahn with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra.

Valerie Coleman has a multi-faceted career as a Grammy-nominated flutist, composer, educator, and entrepreneur. She was a founding member and flutist of Imani Winds, an acclaimed chamber ensemble featured in an exhibit at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. She co-founded and performs as a flutist with the trio Umama Womana. As a solo performer and chamber musician, she has appeared with the Philadelphia Orchestra, Hartford Symphony, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Miami String Quartet, Harlem String Quartet and Quarteto Latinoamericano, and prominent soloists such as Yo-Yo Ma, David Shifrin, and Paquito D’Riveria.

Major arts organizations have commissioned her music, including the Baltimore Symphony, Louisville Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and the Library of Congress. She was appointed professor of composition at the Juilliard School and frequently conducts masterclasses and chamber workshops throughout the US and abroad. She created the Imani Winds Chamber Music Festival to serve as a summer mentorship program for 100 leaders worldwide.

Watch a performance of Umoja by Imani Winds at the Mansion at Strathmore.

Watch Valerie Coleman discuss her life as a performing artist and composer.

Born in Berkeley, CA, Latin Grammy winner and Grammy-nominated composer and pianist Gabriela Lena Frank is the composer in residence at the Philadelphia Orchestra. She is quoted, “I think often about that time in my youth when I began to call myself a composer: Slipping over from being of a casually creative mind to a fully intentional one and no longer feeling like an imposter as I embraced a daily habit of piano practice and composing. Such industry! And over these many years, music has become the most potent form of self-knowledge I have at my disposal: I learn how graceful I am, how disciplined I am, how imaginative I am, how willing I am to take a risk and try something scary new. I put these endeavors in the context of previous work, and I look down a long humbling vista of where I need to go in the future.”

The Los Angeles Opera, Philadelphia Orchestra, and San Francisco Symphony have recently premiered her works in addition to commissions by the Boston Symphony, Atlanta Symphony, The Cleveland Orchestra, Yo-Yo Ma, the King’s Singers, and Cuarteto Latinoamericano with guitarist Manuel Barrueco. Frank founded the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy for the Arts to support and mentor developing composers. She currently works in her home state to enhance the Anderson Valley Unified School District’s music program supporting a large Latino population. She holds degrees in music composition from Rice University and a doctorate from the University of Michigan.

Watch Apu: Tone Poem for Orchestra performed by the National Youth Ensemble conducted by Marin Alsop.

Watch Gabriela Lena Frank discuss her life as a multi-cultural artist with a hearing impairment, the joys of teaching at youth concerts, and her motivation for starting the Creative Academy for the Arts.

Amanda Harberg’s compositions cover a wide range of instruments, weaving classical traditions with contemporary music influences.  Noted composer John Corigliano said of her music, “She invigorates the brain and touches the soul.” The Cleveland Classical describes her music as “conveying a thoroughly original sense of happiness in music.” Harberg’s music has been performed by major orchestras, including the 2021 premiere of her Piccolo Concerto by soloist Erica Peel, with Maestro Yannick Nezet-Seguin conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra. Her robust catalog of music for wind instruments is frequently performed at conventions and professional recitals. The Chicago Symphony notes that Harberg is a “hero to the flute and piccolo community.” Her commercial work includes writing scores for The Abominable Crime, an award-winning feature documentary, Beyond Borders: Undocumented Mexican Americans, which aired over 2,000 times on PBS, as well as scores for shorter files for Common Good Productions.

In addition to composing, Harberg is a concert-level pianist appearing with many soloists and leading orchestral players in recitals and collaborative projects. A dedicated educator, Harberg has taught composition, piano, music theory, aural skills, and music history for over 20 years. She is an Associate Professor at the Berklee College of Music, an instructor at Interlochen Arts Camp, and a frequent guest artist at schools and universities where she works with young composers and performers.

Watch Amanda Harber’s award winning work, Feathers and Wax for flute and piano, composed for and performed by flute soloist Dr. Julietta Curenton (Levine alumna) and Lydia Brown, piano.

Watch Amanda Harberg, piano performing Excursions for wind quintet and piano with the U.S. Army Wind Quintet.

Clarice Assad’s music invites audiences to engage with various contemporary topics, including climate change, equality, social justice, and empowering younger voices through performances, commissions, and educational programs. As an entrepreneur, Assad created the innovative Voxploration music education program in 2015, which teaches young students from around the world to use their voices and bodies as musical instruments.

Her Voxploration podcast explores hip hop, improvisational jazz, beatbox, art song, maqam, and more topics related to contemporary music. Assad’s compositions have been commissioned and performed by major orchestras and prominent soloists such as Yo-Yo Ma. She is also a popular recording artist with seven solo album releases

Watch her performance of the classic Brazilian choro, Agua de Beber, arranged by and performed with guitarist Joao Luiz Rezende.

Watch a performance of Flight of the Fairies for piano, flute and cello in a performance by Dr. Ceylon Mitchell II (Levine faculty), flute, Erin Murphy Snedecor, cello, and Dr. Elizabeth Hill, piano.

Grammy-winning pianist and composer Hiromi Uehara was born in Hamamatsu, Japan, and began her music studies on the piano at age 6. She came to the United States as a collegiate student at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts, before embarking on a global career as a composer, recording, and touring artist. She has released 12 full-length albums and frequently appears in Downbeat’s Annual Critics and Readers Poll. She headlines at top jazz festivals worldwide, including Montreaux, Umbrina, Newport, and Monterey. She was a featured soloist at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics opening ceremony.

Known professionally as Hiromi, her music is described as erasing the lines between jazz, classical, and improvisation. She states that her new release, Sonicwonderland, is “a new journey of adventure.”

Watch a performance of Balloon Pop.

Watch ‘A Conversation with Hiromi Uehara,’ an interview with Library of Congress Music Specialist and Concert Producer Claudia Morales followed by a special performance on George Gershwin’s piano.

Angélica Negrón is a Puerto Rican-born composer and multi-instrumentalist who writes for orchestra, voice, film, toys, and electronic music. Based in Brooklyn, NY, upcoming premieres of her works include a cello concerto with soloist Yo-Yo Ma and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and a new requiem for the Dallas Symphony Orchestra. Other prominent organizations have commissioned her works, including the New York Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, and the Kronos Quartet.

As a guest curator for the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Green Umbrella series (2025), under the creative direction of John Adams, Negrón brings together collaborators Lido Pimienta and Darian Donovan Thomas. As the recipient of the 2022 Hermitage Greenfield Prize, Negrón composed a new work synchronized to the setting sun for EnsembleNewSRQ.

Negrón’s original scores include the HBO docuseries Menudo: Forever Young and You Were My First Boyfriend directed by Cecilia Aldarondo. She regularly performs solo shows and is a founding member of the tropical electronic band Balún. As an educator, she has been a teaching artist with NY Philharmonic’s Very Young Composers program and with Lincoln Center Education.

Watch Chorus of the Forest recorded in the Thain Family Forest, Bronx, NY.

Watch Marejada a work composed in 2020 specifically for online performance and performed by the Kronos Quartet.
Free download of the score and parts for Marejada.

Indian American composer Reena Esmail, based in Los Angeles, CA, has written commissions for prominent ensembles, including the Seattle Symphony, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Kronos Quartet, and the Los Angeles Master Chorale. Her music has been featured on Grammy-nominated albums by the ensembles Imani Winds, Conspirare, and Brooklyn Rider. Esmail earned degrees in composition at the Julliard School and the Yale School of Music. Esmail is the Los Angeles Master Chorale’s 2020-2025 Swan Family Artist in Residence and was the Seattle Symphony’s 2020-21 Composer-in-Residence. She also holds awards/fellowships from United States Artists, the S&R Foundation, the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Kennedy Center.

Her music brings together Western classical and Indian traditional music. She also seeks to bring together people for equitable music spaces and is the Artistic Director of Shasta, a non-profit that promotes cross-cultural music connections. With respect to her teaching work, she states, “my favorite thing to teach is Music Theory 101. I really thought I was going to grow up to be a music theory teacher – and even though I’ve taught almost every theory course up through the top levels of the theory core sequence at Yale University, I still have a special love for teaching beginning theory.”

Watch Jhula Jhule for flute and piano a work based on two Indian folk songs performed by Levine faculty members Heidi Schuller, flute and Dana Smith, piano. The program, Levine Presents: Journey Across the World and Back, also features music by female composers Jean Ahn, Allison Loggins-Hull, Teresa Carreno, Eleanor Alberga, and Undine Smith Moore.

Watch the Seraph Brass performance of Tuttarana. The title is based on a combination of the Italian music term, Tutti, meaning ‘all’ or ‘everyone’ and the Indian term ‘tarana’ which designates a specific Hindustani musical form, whose closet Western counterpart is the ‘scat’ in jazz.