Focus on women composers: Schumannfest 2019

Her father Friedrich Wieck trained her to become a superstar among pianists. Her husband Robert Schumann was ambivalent about her performing and composing activities. To Johannes Brahms, Clara Schumann was an esteemed adviser and intimate friend. But with Clara Schumann research getting underway in recent years, she is gradually emerging from under the shadow of the men in her life.

Blind from age four, she played piano at the Austrian court as a child and was celebrated on concert tours. Mozart is said to have written a piano concerto for her. But Maria Theresia von Paradis was also a composer. Art songs, piano works and chamber music created by her first appeared in print in 1786. She also wrote two piano concertos, cantatas and operas.

The first professional woman composer in music history was celebrated across Europe as the "female Beethoven." Emilie Mayer never married. After her death, her music was largely forgotten, and only a small part of her oeuvre including eight symphonies, 15 concert overtures and diverse chamber music works has been published.

"The most brilliant woman I have ever encountered" was how Clara Schumann described her. Pauline Garcia was one of the 19th century's greatest vocalists. Her marriage to the author Louis Viardot in 1840 was a boon to her compositional activities: he did everything he could to support her. After her stage career ended, she had many productive years as a composer.

The most prominent woman in early jazz played piano, sang, composed and arranged music for the best bands in New Orleans. In 1921 she met Louis Armstrong; they married three years later. She was a major factor in his success, writing songs like "Struttin' with Some Barbecue," "Don't Jive Me," "Two Deuces," "Knee Drops," "Doin' the Suzie-Q" and "Just for a Thrill."

After studying under the American composer Walter Piston, she met George Gershwin, who hired her as a rehearsal pianist. That was Ann Ronell's ticket to Broadway. In 1932 she wrote her most famous song "Willow Weep for Me." Later on came music for cartoons, film scores and ballet music.