For this their third album for Chandos, the Neave Trio chose to celebrate the work of three outstanding female musical pioneers.

Louise Farrenc studied piano with Clementi and Hummel, and composition with Reicha. She was the first female Professor at the Paris Conservatoire, teaching piano there from 1842 until 1872, although it took her a decade to achieve equal pay with her male colleagues.

Rebecca Clarke was a composer and viola player, and became the first female player in Henry Wood’s Queen’s Hall Orchestra, in 1912.

Amy Beach was an American pianist and composer, and her Gaelic Symphony, premiered by the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1896, was the first symphony composed and published by an American woman.

These piano trios, so vividly contrasting in style, provide an excellent gateway into the sound-worlds of three diverse, pioneering composers.