Various Artists - Femmes Fatales - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

The duo's second album on Solo Musica celebrates the song repertoire of women composers from Romanticism to Contemporary Music with 24 songs by 24 women composers. The Swiss soprano Franziska HEINZEN and British-Polish-German pianist Benjamin MEAD set out to research the work of women composers for Clara SCHUMANN's bicentenary in 2019 - and discovered a valuable treasure of relatively unknown music. Beginning with a life journey through refreshing spring feelings, the album goes on to describe painful hours of loneliness and uncertainty as well as anxious premonitions of death and dark fears. Five examples of self-confident female characters, whose experiences are concluded with wiser, reflections on life, as seen retrospectively. Album Tracks 1. June Twilight 2. Heure Exquise 3. Laue Sommernacht 4. Ah, Love, But a Day 5. Am Strande 6. Mélodies (10), for voice & piano~Le Regard Éternel 7. Hilf Mir! 8. Mélodies (4) for voice & piano~Le Bonheur S'Effeuille et Passe 9. Insel der Vergessenheit 10. Dying Is Fine) But Death 11. Warum Sind Denn Die Rosen So Blass 12. Night Dances~Sleep, Mourner, Sleep! 13. Ballades (4) de Paul Fort~Le Diable Dans la Nuit 14. Yellow Leaves~Farewell 15. Alma Phantasien~Nur der Seinen Leben 16. Ophelia's Song 17. Loreley 18. Poèmes (5) for voice & piano~Le Sommeil de Leïlah 19. Song of a Nightclub Proprietress 20. Ewige Liebe 21. Écouter et ne Rien Entendre 22. Ob Ich Manchmal Dein Gedenke 23. Ma Première Lettre 24. Remembrance

Voies(x) de femme is an album grouping twenty-six pieces for soprano and piano, performed by the soprano Theodora Cottarel and the pianist and composer Tiziana de Carolis. It also includes a piece for choir and piano performed by the choir Florilegium vocis, conducted by Sabino Manzo, and accompanied by the pianist Maria Gabriella Bassi. The works which make up this album have one thing in common and that is they are all composed by women; past and present composers who have succeeded through sheer willpower in making their voices (voix) heard and in following their artistic paths (voies), despite prejudice and masculine predominancy in the musical world. The album Voies(x) de femmes desires to reveal to the general public pages of music of great quality, often unpublished, unknown or underestimated. Album Tracks 1. Dansons la Gigue 2. La Vie, L'amour 3. L'heure Exquise 4. L'inconstante 5. Barcarolle 6. Les Lilas Qui Avaient Fleuri 7. Une Mouche 8. Le Cerf 9. L'araignée 10. Les Feuilles Frissonnent 11. Le Lézard 12. Le Chêne Et Le Roseau 13. Le Corbeau Et Le Renard 14. Vrai Dieu Qui M'y Confortera 15. Souvent Un Air de Vérité 16. Mon Mari M'a Diffamée 17. Les Trois Présents 18. Loulou 19. Et Pourquoi? 20. Non! 21. Reflets 22. Deux Ancolies 23. Pâle Aurore 24. Philéasine Foggette 25. Le Bocal 26. Mensonge Pour de Vrai 27. Linea Riflessa

Juliette Hurel and Hélène Couvert, who have long enjoyed a close rapport on the concert and on disc, here celebrate five French women composers at the turn of the twentieth century. Countess Clémence de Grandval was the composer of some sixty songs, of which Saint-Saëns said 'They would certainly be famous if their composer did not have what many people regard as the irremediable defect of being a woman.' Augusta Holmès earned the admiration of Liszt, Wagner and Saint-Saëns. To mark the Universal Exhibition of 1889, she composed a monumental work for more than a thousand musicians. During her studies at the Conservatoire, Mélanie Bonis fell madly in love with a singer, but had to marry a rich industrialist. She later returned to composition and used the pseudonym Mel Bonis, leaving her gender in doubt. Cécile Chaminade displayed extraordinary gifts at a very early age. Bizet called her 'My little Mozart'. Lili Boulanger received her first music lessons from her sister, the famous teacher Nadia. In 1913, at the age of nineteen, she became the first woman to receive the Prix de Rome. The word 'compositrice' was born! Album Tracks 1. Sonate~I. Andantino con moto 2. Sonate~II. Scherzo-Vivace 3. Sonate~III. Adagio 4. Sonate~IV. Finale-Moderato 5. Nocturne 6. D'un Matin de Printemps 7. Suite~I. Prélude 8. Suite~II. Scherzo 9. Suite~III. Menuet 10. Suite~IV. Romance 11. Suite~V. Final 12. Pièce, Op. 189 13. Scherzo (Finale), Op. Posthume 187 14. Sérénade aux Étoiles, Op. 142 15. Trois Petites Pièces~Chanson 16. Trois Petites Pièces~Clair de Lune 17. Trois Petites Pièces~Gigue