Kvinnelige komponister i skyggen av tradisjonell musikkhistorie

Abstract

This article focuses on why women composers have been forgotten and neglected in the standard history of Western music, and attempts to reconstruct the social context within which female composers found themselves at the end of the 18th century. The problem is exemplified by the English composer Maria Hester Park (1760-1813), whose works have been almost entirely neglected up to now. Park composed in the musical language of the early classicism and all her works show that she was an accomplished composer. So why has she been completely ignored? There are several reasons why women composers are forgotten today. They were facing many obstacles in their effort to be taken seriously as composers and music historians up till now have apparently ignored them. In order to include women it is therefore necessary, as a music researcher, to include other factors, when writing a history of music. Many researchers in this field are now starting to have reservations about forcing women’s lives and experiences into male categories, and the use of traditional music historical periods often results in the disappearance of women from historical accounts. Instead of focusing on masterpieces, as representative works for a whole period, we must instead include the whole music history – the whole musical practice, and study the place of women composers within this context.