I am listening …
I recently discovered the new recording Fortissima by cellist Raphaela Gromes and pianist Julian Riem, all about forgotten women composer. Gromes takes the idea of liner notes to the extreme (in a good way) and has published a book alongside her album Fortissima! Marginalized Women Composers and How They Change My Perspective on the World (together with Susanne Wosnitzka). Album and book form a unique piece of music and text that gives long-forgotten female composers the attention they deserve. Through this project, I’ve been introduced to Luise Adolpha le Beau (1850-1927), who has only recently begun to be performed more widely. She was, in fact, Composer of the Week just over a year ago on the BBC for the first time (downloadable only in the UK https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0k8mhxm). I just listened to her fabulous Cello Sonata in D Major, op 17.
Or consider this fabulous cello concerto by Marie Jaëll (1846-1925), a composer I had never encountered before either.
Born in 1846, Jaëll was a pianist (the first to perform all of Beethoven’s piano sonatas in Paris), composer and pedagogue. She studied composition with Camille Saint-Saëns, who dedicated several works to her, and with César Franck. Franz Liszt, with whom she studied from 1868, was a major artistic influence and held her in high esteem as a composer, dedicating his Third Mephisto Waltz(1883) to her. Thanks to Saint-Saëns’s support, she became one of the first women admitted to the Société des compositeurs in Paris in 1887. She later withdrew from composing and performing to focus on developing her piano teaching method.
This is just one of many biographies of women composers that are both fascinating and often deeply frustrating to read. Many of the works featured on Fortissima were, until recently, inaccessible - lost, forgotten in private collections, or never published. Gromes album and book represents yet another milestone in bringing greater visibility to the work of women artists, a fantastic achievement.
I love the idea of being able to dive deeper into the research and thoughts behind an album. Hopefully the accompanying book will be published in English very soon.
Streaming music, however, often tempts listeners away from experiencing an album as it meant to be listened to. As a result, the carefully thought-through, curated approach and narrative behind an album can easily be lost. Many listeners have become increasingly detached from artists and the ideas that shape their work, losing a deeper sense of connection behind the sound.
I am looking at …
This is where Sleevenote comes in. They aim to bring full sleeves and booklet art to the digital experience, including lyrics, translations, liner notes, credits and more - displayed cleanly, without other interface distractions. All of this will soon be available on a new device currently in development. It is a music player that places artist intent and the (nearly) lost art of record collecting at the forefront of the experience. The device only plays music you actually buy and download from places like Bandcamp, deliberately skipping Spotify, Apple Music and other streaming services to keep ownership separate from endless scrolling - and to support the artists!! Designer Tom Vek describes it as “a cross-pollination of a vinyl record and an iPod”, designed to restore the connection between listener and artist.
I am excited to try it out and getting back into proper listening again (I once owned a record player). Once I get my hands on one, I will share how it works for me.
Meanwhile, Spotify has begun trying to repair its increasingly tarnished reputation by introducing SongDNA and About the Song, designed to “inspire fans to go deeper into your creative world and process” (Spotify). The company has realised it’s a good idea “to spotlight the humans, creative process, and stories behind the music.” (Spotify)
While this is a long-overdue move to recognise the teams behind the streams, and provide more info and background, it so far doesn’t seem to work well for the classical music genre. Calling a movement “a song” already makes my skin crawl. Classical metadata is inherently complex: tracks often contain multiple movements, and proper crediting requires accurate attribution of performers and composers. So far I have not found much to get excited about, a lot of the promised info is still missing (I know - it is a work in progress), and the homepage looks even messier and more distracting. Nice try, Spotify, but I feel it is too little, too late, and it does not address the payment structure either (!) - so I am not convinced.
In the end, what matters most is connection - to the music, the performers, and the stories behind the album. Streaming services are now trying, but music deserves tools that truly honour its creative approach, on all levels.
In diesem Sinne, till next time,
Kirsten
PS. This album is Gromes’s second major project spotlighting women composers. In her first album, Femmes (2023), she focused on works by female composers from the Baroque to the present day. With Fortissima, she turns her attention to large-scale works by women composers. Both albums were created in partnership with Furore Verlag (a publishing firm dedicated exclusively to music by women composers), Sony Classical, and the Archiv Frau und Musik (Women in Music Archive) in Frankfurt, Germany.