Finishing up my article "Curating an Archive of Silent Film Music by Women." Two case studies: one of pianist/organist Charlotte Stafford, who accompanied film, rhythm classes, and at dance studios. Her collection of music is unique in that it's focused heavily on love songs. I wonder if she ever played for taxi dance places, but there's no evidence of that. There is, though, a huge number of romance and rom-com movies from the 1920s, and I think she collected her music to play for those. Plus following the war and the flu epidemic, audiences sough happy endings--usually het couples getting married--in movies. Case 2 is composer Lily Strickland, whose songs often draw from Black, Southern music, Native American music, and Indian music. She didn't accompany film, but she knew that getting her pieces included in collections of genre music for movies was an easy way to make money and spread her name and fame. #Musicology #SilentFilmMusic #MovieMusic #WomenInMusic #WomenComposers

I’m delighted and honored to be awarded the 2023 Virgil Thomson Fellowship by the Society for American Music for “Analyzing Rosa Rio’s Accompaniments for Silent Film,” which is a part of my larger book project titled *Race and Gender in Silent Film Music*. Thank you, SAM! #Musicology #FilmMusic #SilentFilmMusic

Given the presence of ChatGPI and other things making up paper titles, scholar info, and more, I'm thinking that I need to make it abundantly clear that the "imaginary archive" I describe in my current research article is just that: imaginary. So instead of the bibliography-like paragraphs that conclude the essay, I'm going to turn them into a list of "wants" rather than "haves." #AcademicWriting #Archives #SilentFilm #SilentFilmMusic #WomenInHistory

Article--"Creating an Archive of Silent Film Music by Women"--draft done. Now to edit. #Writing #AcademicWriting #WomensHistory #SilentFilmMusic #SilentFilm

I've written about the music used to accompany this movie, at least a some theaters. Read me here: https://hcommons.org/app/uploads/sites/1001127/2015/11/Fontes-2016-Leonard.pdf #SilentFilm #SilentFilmMusic #***CinémaMuet #Stummfilm***
https://masto.ai/@JessMcGrath/109976574177955588

Just went down a long and wonderful rabbit hole on cinema organist and composer Litta Lynn. As is too often in the case of women cinema musicians, her music library, most of her works, and any info about her improvisations is lost. #SilentFilmMusic #FilmMusic #SilentFilm

#FilmMusic folks, have you come across sheet music by María Grever? I keep finding citations that she composed for Paramount and Fox in the 1920s, but haven’t yet found a catalogue or any evidence of this work. I’m getting a copy of Maria Luisa Rodriguez Lee’s bio of her, and would appreciate any other leads! #SilentFilm #SilentFilmMusic #WomenComposers #MexicanComposers

Today I’m doing work at SFSMA.org, the online #archive of silent film music that I founded & run. SFSMA is a non-profit and is volunteer-run, and we recently got some amazing stuff from very generous donors. SFSMA isn’t on Mastodon, yet, but I’ll post updates here on my account. Check us out if you’re interested in what folks played for movies by Buster Keaton, Lois Weber, and others! #SilentFilm #SilentFilmMusic #Musicology