A fascinating life

A pioneering feminist songwriter. A radical political activist. A ‘genius’ according to Mendelssohn. Writer of ‘the music we all waited for’ according to Robert Browning. Eliza Flower (1803–1846) was all these things and more. Personal scandal ruined her legacy in the censorious Victorian era, but after nearly 200 years, her remarkable music is being brought back to life.

Dr Jensen, a NUAcT Fellow who is researching the history of song at Newcastle University’s International Centre for Music Studies, has conducted extensive research into Flower’s life. He says: "In her music, as in her life, Eliza Flower was an inspiration and an innovator. Some of her songs are up there with the canonical Lieder writers of the era, but they have hooks as well. And of course she wrote the original music for her sister Sarah’s hymn ‘Nearer, My God, To Thee’ – which is, to my mind, a piece of heart-wrenching beauty, whatever your personal belief or lack of it. I can’t wait for more people to hear this music again."

This performance, in collaboration with Frances M Lynch, Artistic Director of Electric Voice Theatre, will share Eliza Flower’s fascinating life, her politics and her innovative music – which includes delightful songs for the seasons, dramatic hymns and powerful protest songs.

Concert goers will discover her interpretations of the works of contemporary writers like Sir Walter Scott; her music within the context of her contemporaries Franz Schubert and Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel; and her frequent collaborations with radical feminist Harriet Martineau, and her sister, the poet Sarah Flower Adams (1805 – 1848) - the author of the hymn “Nearer My God to Thee”. Eliza’s original music for the hymn had been lost, but attendees have this unique opportunity to be among the first to hear this searingly beautiful work since 1846.

Unique opportunity

The sister’s highly unusual song cycle “Free Trade Songs of the Seasons” has inspired new work by  women composers (the Flower Composers), including Newcastle’s own Anna Appleby and an oil painting by a young Essex artist Elspeth Manders which will be exhibited alongside photographs of Flower’s archive from Conway Hall, London.

Electric Voice Theatre will be joined for the performance by special guests including The Flower Singers, a specially formed group of Newcastle University students, and the recorded voices of children from Chillingham Primary School and Gosforth Middle School who will be participating in creative workshops on campus earlier in the week.

The performance, which will be BSL interpreted, will take place in the Recital Room, Armstrong Building, Newcastle University, on Sunday 5th May 2024, from 4pm to 6pm.  A Touch Tour for hearing imapired audience members will take place at 3.30pm. Tickets are free and are available here.

This event is  supported by Newcastle University,  The National Lottery Heritage Fund, SCOPS Arts, Conway Hall and the Hinrichsen Foundation.

Press release adapted with thanks to Electric Voice Theatre