Deleting Women’s History Won’t Silence the Women Who Composed It

The history of classical music is incomplete without the voices of women. Though long sidelined by institutions and societal norms, their creativity has not only persisted but transformed the genre itself. Yet in 2025, this erasure extends beyond the concert hall. Google recently removed cultural observances like Women’s History Month and International Women’s Day from its calendar service, along with Black History Month, Pride Month, Jewish Heritage Month, and others. The company justified it was "too difficult to keep up with every occasion," despite these observances being officially recognized for decades. Women’s History Month has been federally recognized since 1987, while Black History Month has been acknowledged since 1976, with origins dating back to historian Carter G. Woodson’s Negro History Week in 1926. Women’s History Month itself began as a weeklong observance in 1980, initiated by President Jimmy Carter, before expanding to a full month through lobbying efforts.

The long-established nature of these observances makes Google's reasoning all the more absurd. This shift reflects a broader trend where institutions, once eager to champion diversity, now retreat into silence, erasing moments of recognition that have long held significance for marginalized communities. The irony is stark. At a time when recognition and representation matter more than ever, one of the world’s largest tech companies has chosen to render these moments invisible. This retreat into silence is part of a larger historical pattern, one where women’s contributions to culture, including classical music, have been systematically overlooked.

Yet the contributions of women in classical music cannot be so easily erased. Despite historical barriers such as restricted access to formal education, societal expectations that confined their artistry to domestic settings, and the systemic neglect of their contributions due to gender bias, these composers and countless others have fundamentally enriched the landscape of classical music. Acknowledging and celebrating their achievements isn’t just about filling in the gaps—it’s about reshaping music history to reflect the full scope of its richness.

Barbara Strozzi – Lagrime mie (1659)
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube.

Barbara Strozzi’s Lagrime mie (My Tears) is more than music—it’s resistance. The cantata’s opening—a chromatic descent on the word Lagrime—doesn’t just set the mood; it’s a cry of defiance. Strozzi weaves through shifting forms—recitative, arioso, aria—mirroring the narrator’s anguish over his beloved Lidia’s imprisonment. The expressive melismas and harmonic tensions are more than ornamental; they heighten the drama, revealing a composer who understood music as both an emotional force and a personal statement. Centuries later, her work remains not just an artifact, but a reminder: great art endures, no matter the barriers.



Despite the constraints of her time, Strozzi published more than many of her male peers, building a legacy not on institutional support but sheer artistic power. Even as she conformed to the Baroque tradition of writing male-narrated texts for soprano, her compositions transcended those limitations, ensuring her voice—through her music—was never truly silenced.

Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel – Das Jahr (1841)
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube.



Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel’s Das Jahr (The Year) is a masterpiece that nearly didn’t survive history. A piano cycle spanning twelve movements, each representing a month, it’s more than a collection of pieces—it’s an intimate musical diary. Composed in 1841 and dedicated to her husband, Das Jahr weaves together barcarolles, caprices, lieder, and chorales like Christ ist erstanden, creating a richly layered, deeply personal sound world.

The September piece, Am Flusse (By the River), was published separately in her opus 2, a rare glimpse of her work finding daylight during her lifetime.



Yet Hensel’s compositions remained confined largely to the domestic sphere, unrecognized by the wider world. This historical invisibility parallels contemporary institutional erasures, highlighting systemic challenges that women continue to face. Today, the brilliance of Das Jahr is undeniable, rewriting history to affirm that stories about music have, for too long, left out half the voices.

Kaija Saariaho – L’Amour de loin (2000)
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube.

Kaija Saariaho’s L’Amour de loin (Love from Afar) is a triumph of modern opera—an ethereal, spectralist-infused meditation on longing and distance. Premiered in 2000, the work defies traditional conventions, immersing listeners in a dreamlike world where sound and texture matter as much as melody. Saariaho’s success demonstrates that institutional recognition profoundly matters—underscoring why erasures like Google's are not merely symbolic but consequential.

***

Women in classical music have always been here. They’ve always been composing, performing, innovating. Their music has endured not because the world made space for them, but because they refused to be silenced. The question has never been whether their work exists—it’s whether we choose to listen. And if history has taught us anything, it’s that erasure is never the end of the story. What has been overlooked can be reclaimed, what has been dismissed can be celebrated, and what was once pushed to the margins can take center stage if we make the choice to hear it.