Singing for democracy - how women composers fought for freedom and civil society
“Democracies die in daylight”. These letters shone silver on the evening gown worn by climate activist Luisa Neubauer on the red carpet at the 2025 Berlinale. On that February day, the year was still young, but hope had already turned grey and withered. In the USA, the motherland of modern democracy, a historic election had just shaken the constitutional state, giving new impetus to right-wing populist forces in Europe. And unfortunately, there is no change in the weather in sight: the enemies of democracy have the wind at their backs and are undermining the foundations of open and free society from both outside and within.
If they get their way politically, things will become particularly uncomfortable for women: A reactionary image of women is already flourishing on social media. Trad-wife content and stay-at-home-girlfriend videos send women back to the kitchen and reduce femininity to domestic and reproductive utility. Hard-won achievements such as the right to physical self-determination are being demonised and attacked. The dirty slogans of the manosphere – ‘your body, my choice’ – are running riot in the digital space with their misogynistic antics.
Where can we find hope in times like these? Sometimes, when the present lets us down, it is worth taking a look at the past. Not because we want to bury our heads in the sand, but because it can be helpful to broaden our perspective: Generations before our time, people fought for political change – and succeeded!
Throughout history, numerous female composers have also raised their voices for a strong and free civil society. They already knew then what should be self-evident today: that free art can only exist in a free society. In their stories and their music, we find comfort – and the strength not to give up hope. Because not everything has been decided yet.
Ethel Smyth (1858-1944)
British composer Ethel Smyth had no illusions that, as a woman composer, she was operating at a critical intersection between art and politics.
‘I want women to take on big and difficult tasks. They shouldn't just hang around on the coast, afraid to set sail,’ she demanded. Smyth lacked neither the courage nor the desire to set sail: in 1910, she joined the Women's Social and Political Union, a movement that fought on the streets for the introduction of women's suffrage. Smyth composed an anthem for them, March of the Women. But it did not stop at poetic declarations alone: when Smyth attacked the windows of the British Colonial Office with a stone during a demonstration in London's Mayfair district, she was sent to prison for two months. This experience is reflected in her composition The Prison – a secular cantata for choir, soloists and orchestra that follows the last thoughts and breaths of a prisoner sentenced to death.
Johanna Kinkel (1810-1858)
Some 60 years earlier, Johanna Kinkel also defied the state. Although she did not throw stones, she was the mastermind behind a spectacular rescue operation: her husband Gottfried Kinkel had been imprisoned for several months in Spandau Prison, which was considered escape-proof. He had been imprisoned by the Prussian authorities after the staunch democrat joined the Baden-Palatinate uprising during the unrest of 1848. His wife Johanna did not hesitate for long and rallied her loyal friends. With the support of a prison guard who had been bribed in advance, Gottfried Kinkel was finally lowered from the window of his prison cell to freedom on the night of 7th November. Together, the couple fled into exile in England.
Beyond political activism, Johanna Kinkel also created a musical monument to democracy - in the Democratenlied she composed, to which she herself wrote the lyrics, she sings:
Humanity was the goal of our struggle!
See if you can break our rights
And our defences –
Bring on democracy!
Elfrida Andreé (1841-1929)
Elfrida Andrée wanted to become an organist. The problem was that in her native Sweden at that time, the position of organist was reserved exclusively for men. To make her dream come true, Andrée appealed to the king himself. Her second attempt finally brought the breakthrough: in 1861, Oskar I of Sweden changed the law. From then on, women were also allowed to work as cathedral and church organists.
Inspired by this success, Elfrida Andrée immediately ventured into her next endeavour - after passing the telegraph office exam herself in 1860, she asked the royal family to make this profession accessible to women as well. She was successful again and thus opened up new career prospects for numerous women.
Elfrida Andrée was also committed to social causes: she organised over 800 so-called ‘people's concerts’, which gave poor and low-income members of the population access to musical events. As a composer, Elfrida Andrée left behind over 100 works, including two symphonies – a genre that is still traditionally associated with male genius.
Hedda Wagner (1876-1950)
Hedda Wagner was actually a daughter of a middle-class family; her father was a doctor and enabled her to study composition privately at great expense. But the artistic ivory tower was not enough for Hedda Wagner; she sought proximity to current political events and joined the Austrian Social Democratic Workers' Party (SDAP) in 1912, where she was active in the state education committee.
She also worked as an editor for the social democratic daily newspaper Tagblatt and, from 1923, took over the management and editing of the Sunday women's supplement Das neue Werden. In her articles, she mainly represented pacifist positions and warned of the approaching war. In 1934, she was therefore banned from writing by the Austrian government.
Her convictions also found their way into her compositions, such as the choral piece ‘Die rote Nelke’ (The Red Carnation), which can be read as a homage to social democracy, or her singspiel ‘Das Lied vom letzten Krieg’ (The Song of the Last War), which premiered in 1924.
Laura Netzel (1839-1927)
Although Laura Netzel, a Swedish woman, also came from a wealthy family, she was deeply committed to social issues: her extensive charitable activities included co-founding numerous organisations to combat poverty in Stockholm and organising countless benefit concerts, bazaars and other events that raised large sums of money for charitable causes.
However, women's health care was particularly close to her heart: Laura Netzel was a founding member of a training centre for nurses, the Stockholm Midwives' Association's health fund, and a fund for pregnant women affected by poverty, and was also a board member of a children's hospital, Samariten.
Francine Benoît (1894-1990)
Due to her open opposition to the dictatorship of António de Oliveira Salazar in her adopted home of Portugal, Francine Benoît was unable to obtain an official position at any of the country's conservatories despite several attempts throughout her life. She therefore made a living by giving private lessons and worked occasionally as a freelance music critic. She was a member of the Feminina Portuguesa para a Paz (‘Portuguese Women's Association for Peace’) and rehearsed with the association's children's choir every Sunday morning. In 1945, she joined the Movimento de Unidade Democrática, a democratic movement that opposed Salazar's authoritarian regime.
In 1970, Francine Benoit was elected to the National Council of the Movimento Democrático de Mulheres (Democratic Movement of Women), an organisation that advocated for gender equality and also called for the decriminalisation of abortion.
Honorary mention:
Charlotte Schlesinger (1909-1976)
After Charlotte Schlesinger was forced to flee her hometown of Berlin in 1933 to escape Nazi persecution of Jews, she finally arrived in the United States in 1938 after an odyssey through Prague, Kiev and London. In 1946, she was hired at Black Mountain College in North Carolina and in 1950 at the Wilson School of Music in Washington State. In gratitude to her country of exile, she composed a choral work in 1943 with the programmatic title: We believe. A Cantata of democracy.
by Anna Schors
