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Jon Box of Shrewsbury Symphony Orchestra explains how his group has decided to programme and play work by women composers over the past three years.
In 2019, we decided that our spring 2020 concert would be Ethyl Smyth’s The Wreckers: Overture, Lili Boulanger’s D’un matin de printemps and an Amy Beach symphony. This was quite a radical step, but it had the full support of the committee, as we believed that there is no justification for the absence of works by women composers from standard playlists.
Then as Covid struck, this and many other plans were cancelled. As a group we did everything we could within the regulations to promote playing. During various discussions, there was the inevitable debate of the merits or otherwise of a ‘women only’ concert. Without re-running the discussion, we decided that in our new programme for 2021-22, we would include a work in each of our three concerts. In the revised programmes, Smyth and Boulanger were included with other ‘mainstream’ works of the same era. We also decided to pair Louise Farrenc’s Symphony No.1 in C Minor, Op.32 with Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony.
We used YouTube to identify suitable works and the International Music Score Library Project for available printed material. On a cautionary note, while there are many works for chamber orchestras, finding suitable work for a full symphony orchestra is slightly more difficult. Works like the Smyth then require considerable additional forces.
Feedback from our members and audience has been very positive. It has been interesting that our timing has also coincided with a substantial increase in works by women composers in mainstream concert programmes and radio playlists.
Having said this, there is always a ‘but’. We have found that while the IMSLP has women composers on the site, the number of available works is very restricted. For example, there are no Farrenc symphonies available. The Boulanger piece isn’t there for full orchestra. We hired the Smyth, though I recommend forward planning as there are few copies being chased by many groups at the moment.
'Feedback from our members and audience has been very positive. It has been interesting that our timing has also coincided with a substantial increase in works by women composers in mainstream concert programmes and radio playlists.'
After a fruitless search for a UK source, the Boulanger was hired from Recordi, who hold the part in mainland Europe, so it isn’t cheap to hire and suffers from the additional costs (circa £60) associated with new, post-Brexit arrangements. This was made more complicated by Recordi needing an EORI code. An Economic Operators Registration and Identification number (EORI) is required if you move goods between the UK and the European Union.
As a charity, we already have a Government Gateway (account and sign-in), which we use for Gift Aid applications. With this, it was relatively easy and without any cost to sign in and apply for an EORI, which arrived by email within two days.
We’re in the process of buying the parts for Farrenc’s first Symphony, as we have not found the score and parts available in the UK.
For the future, we will continue to broaden our musical choices and hope that our community of music makers can act together to create a library of suitable works by neglected and worthy composers.
Shrewsbury Symphony Orchestra are set to play Boulanger, Mahler and Sibelius at their concert on 6 April. Find out more on their website
