Louise Farrenc's second quintet wins her further critical acclaim and there's a rare opportunity to hear her writing in the popular ballad style too.

Louise Farrenc may not be a household name in the twenty-first century, but in her own lifetime she enjoyed a career of international standing. Her music was played across Europe; she was twice recognised by the French Institute for her outstanding contribution to chamber music; she was an accomplished pianist who received favourable reviews for her public performances, for thirty years she was a valued teacher at the Paris Conservatoire and in the latter part of her life, she devoted the majority of her time to the preparation of a groundbreaking anthology of keyboard music dating from the 16th to the 19th century.

She was born in 1804, a year before Fanny Hensel, Felix Mendelssohn's older sister. While the majority of her contemporaries had a tendency to focus on smaller forms, songs, choral works and salon pieces for the piano, Farrenc's creative interests involved writing music for much larger combinations of instruments, including quintets, a sextet, a nonet , orchestral overtures and three symphonies.

That's not to say she never contributed to vocal music. Research into Farrenc's extant legacy has established a small collection of her largely unpublished vocal works does exist. For the first time, especially for Composer of the Week, soprano Ruby Hughes, a former Radio 3 New Generation Artist and pianist Anna Tilbrook have recorded four of Farrenc's songs. The BBC Singers, under conductor David Hill have recorded the only two choral settings known to exist. There's an opportunity to hear these vocal rarities spread across the week.

In the fourth instalment of this week of programmes featuring the life and music of Louise Farrenc, Donald Macleod considers the significance of her position as a professor of piano at the prestigious Paris Conservatoire where she encountered Henri Herz, a prolific composer of salon music. As we hear today, in a ballad recorded specially for Composer of the Week, Farrenc could also turn her hand to the domestic market. Show less