Women composers

This section contains links to free and subscription resources with a wide range of tools for finding writings and information about women composers, including biographies, bibliographies, and primary source materials.

See our full-text and bibliographic databases (includes subscription and free web resources). Each electronic resource contains important information about women composers.

• Archiv Frau und  Musik
  • Large international archive: 26,000 items by more than 1,900 women composers (9th to 21st century)
  • Contains primary and secondary literature
  • Provides access to recordings of published works, radio programs, and videos
  • Special collections include a collection of first editions (particularly 19th century) and hand-written letters by Clara Schumann
• American Women: Resources from the Performing Arts Collections
  • Guide to the collections and resources in the Music Division of the Library of Congress that document the lives and work of significant women in music, theatre, and dance
  • Includes links to locating music scores, music literature, special collections (including digital collections), and online resources
• Institute for Composer Diversity
  • Database includes more than 2,800 women composers from around the world
  • Provides a comprehensive Women and Non-Binary Composers’ Bibliography
• The Kapralova Society
  • Publishes research on composer Vitezslava Kapralova and other women musicians in its open access journal and on its website
  • Provides links to resources including bibliographies, databases, and repertoire lists of works by women composers 
  • Includes a list of Women composers of new and experimental music, stage and screen, jazz and fusion music
• Many Many Women
  • International index about various kinds of experimental/avant garde music, including classical, electroacoustic, improvisation, jazz
  • Provides website links to 1000 women composers and musicians
• Sophie Drinker Institut
  • Literature on musicological research on gender and the history of German-language conservatories in the 19th century; includes books, sheet music, and recordings
  • Provides extensive lexicon of instrumentalists (approx. 750 articles)
• Women, Work, and Song in Nineteenth-Century France
  • Selected representation of women song composers
  • Digital exhibition of sheet music about or by women; includes scholarly essays and extensive bibliography
  • Pieces drawn from the 19th-Century French Sheet Music Collection at the Marvin Duchow Music Library

• McGill users only
• Open access resource
• Free resource
• In-library use
• Catalogue record