How to talk about Women Composers

Abstract

Despite multiple efforts from the discipline of feminist musicology, not much results have trickled down into our current educational and cultural canon. In this thesis, I will research multiple aspects of the discipline, seeking for the origins of the lack of result visible in 2017. To start my research, I will first look at the critical reception on the music of women composers, especially claiming objectivity. Along the lines of Donna Haraway, Kimberle Crenshaw and Adrienne Rich, I will analyse YouTube comments to seek out these claims. My second research point will be a historiography of feminist musicology. By looking critically at the problems the discipline encountered, and also the solutions that were posed, I contribute to answering my main question. By conducting a reception research, I confirm multiple stereotypes still standing towards the reception of audiences on classical music. With this, I want to bring internalised prejudices to the conscious minds of an audience. The last chapter is a musical analysis of two Trio’s: Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn’s Trio’s in d minor. By comparing both works, I want to both focus on the music of a women composer, and confirm that analytically, the two pieces should have equal space in the canon. My conclusion revolves mostly around internalised prejudices in the collective reception of music written by women composers. Although difference thinking through categorisation seems inevitable, I propose a more analytical approach, with taking accountability for your own position as a researcher.