Women Composers - Augusta Holmès

Augusta Holmès

France| 1847–1903

Born in Paris, Augusta Holmès showed natural musical talent, though she was not allowed to study at the Paris Conservatoire and instead took lessons in piano and composition privately. She showed some of her early compositions to Franz Liszt and around 1876 became a pupil of César Franck. Like other female composers from the nineteenth century, Holmès published some of her earlier works under a male pseudonym (‘Hermann Zenta’). Later she was recognised in her own right, gaining a reputation especially for composing programme music with political meaning, such as her symphonic poems 'Irlande' and 'Pologne'.

Augusta Holmès

by L. Taponier

Allegro Feroce

for orchestra (1876) · 8’

Roland Furieux

Symphony after Ariosto (1875–1876) · 30’ for large orchestra

Air de Ballet

for orchestra (1870) · 8’