Unsung Women

    Last Sunday was International Women's Day and Radio 3 devoted their output to playing the works of female classical composers, whose historical marginalisation has been even greater than that of female writers and artists. The few I had heard of - Clara Schumann, Lili Boulanger, Germaine Tailleferre, Elizabeth Lutyens - took their place among a whole host of fascinating discoveries such as Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre (1665-1729) whose Céphale et Procris was the first opera written by a woman in France and Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677), the Venetian singer and composer. 

    I was particularly taken by this cantata by Strozzi, remarkably beautiful and somehow completely contemporary in how it communicates in this version by Mariana Flores.