Their names are Barbara Strozzi, Francesca Caccini and Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre. They created remarkable works that left their mark on the Baroque era, although posterity has not done them justice. Discover these portraits of women composers in this historical series.
Having fled to Paris, the Venetian composer and singer Antonia Bembo (1643–1715) Antonia Bembo (1643–1715) led a truly romantic life, marked by a marital escape, royal patronage, and the creation of a musical language that blended Italian and French styles. A pupil of Cavalli, his only opera, “Ercole amante”, is on the bill at the Paris Opera from 28 May.
Françoise-Charlotte de Saint-Nectaire (1679–1745) is the youngest French composer to have had her scores published in France. It must be said that this young prodigy was well surrounded, playing her talent as deftly as her instruments—or her connections.
Born in 1738 to a singer and a stage designer, Anna Bon led an unusually nomadic life across the musical Europe of the eighteenth century alongside her parents. From the Venetian Ospedale della Pietà to the Esterházy court, she moved on to the vibrant musical circles of the Tsarina’s court in St Petersburg and that of the Margravine of Bayreuth.
