By Robert Croan
When I was a graduate student in musicology at Columbia University in the 1950s, the only woman composer we ever studied — and only briefly — was Amy Beach (1867-1944). At that time, she was deemed the only successful American female composer. She had been married to one Dr. Henry Harris Aubrey Beach, and her music was published as composed by Mrs. H.H.A. Beach. We used to refer to her as “Mrs. Ha-Ha Beach.” The idea of a woman composer was something of a joke.
Happily, it’s no longer a joke, and women composers (along with conductors) are finally being taken seriously in the classical music business. Some of the best composers of the last 50 to 75 years are women, and South Florida Symphony Orchestra, under its talented conductor Sebrina Maria Alfonso, has programmed three works by women composers for the 2026-27 season.
Historically, however, there aren’t too many women composers to choose from, so it was a great pleasure that the second of the orchestra’s summer chamber music concerts [seen June 24 in Fort Lauderdale’s Center for Spiritual Development] showcased piano trios by two obscure but worthy women composers of the Romantic era: the French Louise Farrenc (1804-75), and Croatian Dora Pejačević (1885-1923) — who, on her mother’s side, was a Hungarian countess.
Each work was revelatory in its way: Farrenc’s Piano Trio No. 2 in D minor (Op. 34), written in 1844, could easily have passed for a rediscovered opus of Schumann or Mendelssohn; Pejačević’s Piano Trio in C major (Op. 29), dating from 1910, is solidly in the late-Romantic German-school idiom of early Schoenberg or Richard Strauss.
These composers could hardly have had better advocates than the exemplary SFSO performers: violinist Huifang Chen, cellist Christoper Glansdorp and pianist Catherine Lan. Each an accomplished virtuoso, as an ensemble they performed with an interaction and unanimity that went right to the heart of the music at hand.
In the case of Farrenc, her compositional skills were immediately evident in the sonata-form Allegro of the opening movement. The gracefully arched main theme was sharply outlined by Chen’s sturdy statement and Glansdorp’s rich-voiced underpinning, while Lan’s rippling keyboard work came through with a sentiment of pure joy. The central movement’s theme and variations have been compared to a parallel movement in Schubert’s iconic Trout Quintet, which — perhaps not by coincidence — had been played by this group on the previous month’s concert. Virtuosity, on the part of all three performers, marked the exuberant Rondo-finale.
Pejačević’s Trio is a work of greater gravitas: thick and murky, and often rambling in fantasy fashion. Pianist Lan introduced the work by describing its initial Allegro as “rich, lush and inviting” — which, indeed it was in these players’ intense, dedicated rendition. The Scherzo — “quirky and humorous” in Lan’s words, was just that, marked by pizzicati that suggested a fleeting sense of fun. Brief recitative-like arco phrases were deftly punctuated by cadential plunk-plunks.
The consequential Lento movement that followed was lyrical and not all slow, giving way to a lovely Allegretto midway through. The players were particularly expressive in numerous small details, which made this movement a highlight of the evening. There was no letdown in the final movement, where the composer seems to be striving for symphonic effect, and Lan’s robust pianism led the way for the work’s colorful, ear-filling conclusion.