IRIS DE CAIROS-REGO - AUSTRALIA
Iris de Cairos-Rego was first and foremost a pianist and is described as having a formidable technique; being deft and expressive; playing with sparkling precision, and interpreting with charm, freshness and a delicacy of touch. Throughout her long life she developed the skills to become a prolific composer of piano and chamber music and an inspirational teacher.
Iris was one of the first teachers to be engaged at the newly formed Sydney Conservatorium of Music in 1915. In 1914 she joined the Salon Piano trio which gave regular concerts in Sydney. This trio had been formed originally with Mirrie Hill as the pianist and in 1914 Iris replaced Hill as the pianist. At that time the Salon Trio consisted of the players - Iris, Florence Brown (cellist) and Dorothy Curtis (violin). During 1914 Iris gave concerts with the singer, Antonia Dolores in New Zealand and Western Australia and in 1920 appeared as soloist in concertos by Schumann and Beethoven with the NSW State Orchestra and Henri Verbrugghen conducting. She also frequently appeared as associate artist with fellow musicians and teachers from the Conservatorium such as Cyril Monk (violin) and the Austral String Quartet. It has been said that Iris gave the first performance of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue in Australia.
In 1935, Winifred West invited Iris to join the community at Frensham School in the Southern Highlands. Winifred West was born in 1881 in Frensham, Surrey in England - the school, named for her birth village, in Mittagong became a testament to this woman’s remarkable ideas. West collected around her some of the most prominent musicians and artists from the NSW community to teach at her school. Iris was originally invited for a year and ended up spending the rest of her life in the community. Though, most of her compositions for piano, many songs and commemorative works were written during her time of teaching the girls at Frensham and many were dedicated to fellow teachers or students.
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HILDA SEHESTED - DENMARK
BORN 27 APRIL
Hilda Sehested was born in Funen, Denmark, of parents Niels Frederik Bernhard Sehested (1813–82), an archeologist, and Charlotte Christine Linde (1819–94). She studied music with C.F.E. Hornemann in Copenhagen and later with Louise Aglaé Massart in Paris. She studied organ with Ludvig Birkedal-Barfod and composition with Orla Rosenhoff, and began composing at the age of 30.
Hilda Sehested's compositions include all genres except the great orchestral music - concerts and symphonies. Piano pieces and those - not least for female composers - typical songs fill the production well. The chamber music is also richly represented. with works for unconventional herds such as clarinet, English horn, trumpet or cornet and trumpet with piano or strings.
Hilda's main work is the opera Agnete and Havmanden for text by Sophus Michaëlis, which she submitted to The Royal Copenhagen. Theater 1913. The opera was accepted, but never performed despite protests from professionals, and it has never been played. The opera first got its premier performance in October 2014, at the initiative of the Hilda Sehested Committee and The Funen Opera, which gave a concerted performance of the work in Odense Concert Hall and in the concert hall Alsion in Sønderborg.
Sehested's mother died in 1894, and she moved to Copenhagen to live with her sister Thyra. She became engaged to archaeologist and museum director Henry Petersen there, but he died before the wedding. Shocked by his death, Sehested took a job as a nurse for a while and then as a church organist, and eventually returned to composing. She died in Copenhagen.
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Morceau Symphonique by Hilda Sehested
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