Online Resources - Underrepresented Composers & Pedagogy

Searchable Databases:

American Viola Society Database for Underrepresented Composers – You can search by 19 different criteria, including nationality, ethnicity, gender, LGBTQ+,  and country of origin. This is a great database to mine for composer ideas, regardless of your instrument (just takes another step or two on Google to find out if they’ve written for you).

Boulanger Initiative Woman Composer and Gender-Marginalized Composer Repertoire Database – Specializes in promoting music of women and all gender marginalized composers, including historical figures.

Cello Bello maintains a database of works for cellists of all levels  including core repertoire and specialized databases (Sphinx Catalog of Latin American Cello Works, Works by Women Composers, Works by Black Composers, and 21st Century Cello Works). .

Donne, Women in Music’s Big List is a database of over 5000 women composers from pre-medieval times to the present. Results include very basic biographical information and links to websites (often wikipedia bios) where you can find complete or partial works lists.

The University of Michigan’s Hathi Trust contains about 3000 works by 700 women composers, mainly from the 19th-20th centuries. Full scans are available as allowed by copyright. Upon a quick perusal, I see lots of vocal works and piano works to choose from.

The Institute for Composer Diversity is maintained through Fredonia University in NY state, and is full of great resources to, “encourage the discovery, study, and performance of music written by composers from historically excluded groups.” Includes databases searchable by composer, works, art song, wind band, choral, & orchestra. They also publish annual reports on Orchestral Repertoire (in partnership with the League of American Orchestras) and State High School Repertoire (in partnership with the National Federation of High School Associations).

Ithaca College Music Library has a great list of databases, organized by instrument (including voice). If you don’t see a database that looks relevant on the UVMC page, please visit this page! If you find something amazing, let me know and I’ll link to it directly for others to check out.

Music By Black Composers has published volumes of music for violin and piano, with a mind towards pedagogical use and context. Their annotated repertoire directories further include informative lists of works for violin, classical guitar, viola, cello, opera, and wind band, with more in the works. Some lists have sortable/searchable versions and some are simply lists to scroll through. They also maintain a living composers directory, and many other fantastic resources.

The National Flute Association provides a database of works for flute, including the ability to search by race, gender identity nationality, and LGBTQ+ status.

A Seat at the Piano promotes and advocates for the inclusion, study, and performance of a more equitably representative body of piano works. By creating a resource for musicians, pedagogues, and curious music appreciators, ASAP aims to broaden their knowledge of composers and their works. Their site is full of great information, including a database of works.

Other Resources:

Afrocentric Voices in Classical Music focuses on classically trained American singers and composers of African descent and on the vocal music forms they influenced, especially opera and art songs–including Negro spirituals composed for concert performance. Their extensive resources include biographies, bibliographies, and a searchable database of spiritual recordings by solo classical vocalists.

The American League of Orchestras provides a great list of resources for tracking down music by underrepresented composers.

The American Lyric Theater’s Aria Access Project provides access to arias written by program alumni.

Art Song Augmented is an online forum that provides information about underrepresented composers both current and past, including a brief biography, videos of performances of their works, works lists, and resources to find scores of their music. While they focus on vocal music, the list of composers and biographical information has value across instruments.

Castle of Our Skins celebrates Black Artistry in Music. Their programming is full of great information, and they have a small store with published music & curriculum guides.

Decolonizing the Music Room centers Black, Brown, Indigenous, and Asian (BBIA) voices in music education, research, and performance by providing training and educational content to pre-service and practicing educators and creating community programming for people of all ages.

Expanding the Music Theory Canon provides musical examples by underrepresented composers for the music theory classroom. Examples are organized by concept, and the site is easy to navigate.

Inclusive Early Music is a bibliography of traditionally excluded sources focused on music before 1600. Not a repertoire list, but a great starting point to learn about composers you may want to research.

Juilliard’s librarians have put together a great curated list of internet based resources.

The New Muses Project is fun! Enter the name of a composer you like, and it suggests an underrepresented composer for you to check out, including a brief bio, info on some notable works, and external links to learn more about the suggested composer. You can also browse their composers by last name, and check out their recording projects.

The Women’s Song Forum is a great blog style site with substance. Posts would be interesting to many, not just singers. They publish 2-3 well curated posts each month.