Alice Mary Smith (1839 - 1884) was the first British female composer to write a symphony. Find out more about this fascinating composer and some of the issues regarding female composers in music history.
Welcome to my first post!
My hope is to create a series called Composers' Corner, to give a platform for composers who have traditionally been excluded or marginalised in the fields of music history and musicology.
Alice Mary Meadows White, née Smith was a British female composer, who wrote under her maiden name. She was the daughter of a lace merchant and studied composition under two professors at the Royal Academy of Music in London. She married the lawyer Frederick Meadows White, QC, in 1867 and continued to compose until her death in 1884.
The reason I find Smith so interesting is the genres she composed in. Clara Schumann and Fanny Hensel (née Mendelssohn), who are arguably the most well-known female composers of the nineteenth century, only composed in "miniature" genres. What I mean by that is chamber music, music for piano and songs. Such genres were considered more suitable for women, as the symphony was much to "masculine". However, Smith composed in various "large-scale" forms. Her compositional output includes two symphonies, four concert overtures and four cantatas.
A lot of Smith's works weren't published in her lifetime. That meant the scores weren't available after her death and so she and her works have become all but forgotten. However, she did manage to get several vocal works published in her lifetime. Her vocal duet 'Maying' was being published as late as 1944!
However, her manuscripts and unfinished score remained in the family. Many of her and her husband's letters, as well as her music, are kept in the West Sussex Records office. Ian Graham-Jones used this to write the first book on Smith in 2010. He has also edited Smith's symphonies and two of his concert overtures and had them published in Nineteenth Century Music in the early 2003s.
The availability of her scores is an exciting development, although sadly this does not have appeared to lead to many performances. I was very grateful to the Cambridge Minerva Festival, who organised a performance of her A minor symphony this March. This was only the second performance of this work, and the first performance in 10 years. I hope that the future holds many of performances of Smith's works.
Recommend Listening: Very few of Smith's works have been recorded. Audio of her two symphonies is available on YouTube. Her symphonies have been recorded and released on CD (Chandos, 2005), alongside her 'Andante for Clarinet and Orchestra'. Her choral music for Anglican church services have been recorded recently by The Eoferwic Consort and can be found on YouTube.
Upcoming Composers: Ignaz Moscheles and Felix Mendelssohn
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