'Unsung The Wartime Violin' will include works featured in Dr Broad's forthcoming book UNSUNG: Women and Music in World War II (March 2027).

The concert introduces Avril Coleridge Taylor, whose wartime compositions have remained unheard until now. Also featured are violinist Alma Rosé – who went from a celebrity violinist to the leader of the women’s orchestra in Auschwitz – and ballerina Tatiana Vecheslova, who survived performing on the Eastern Front and in Leningrad under siege. Pianists Myra Hess and Elly Ney reveal how Beethoven was used as a wartime symbol in both Britain and Germany. Singer and dancer Josephine Baker was not only one of the most celebrated musicians in the world, but also worked as an intelligence agent for the French and British. And the International Sweethearts of Rhythm were the first racially integrated women’s jazz band in the United States, breaking down racial barriers while proving that women, too, could be extraordinary jazz musicians.

Further details.