The LC clinic say there’s lots you can do to minimise relapses, but some will still happen regardless. This helps me rn. My post-shower dip isn’t a setback: it’s part of the illness’s trajectory. I haven’t gone backwards, rather I’m on course 🤣 🙂 ✊ to everyone living with #longcovid #CFS/ME

Still recovering from taking shower on Thurs. To keep self gently active looked a little into composer Edith Grey (can’t even google her)Jackpot! Grey (1874-1935) trained at Leipizig conservatory. She used money earned from her works to fund music projects in her Devon community😀 #longcovid #CFS ✊

What an extraordinary person - truly awe-inspiring

If you need two mins of something beautiful in your day today look no further than this nocturne by Avril Coleridge-Taylor. Exquisitely played by @aoyarzabal.bsky.social

‘…but for the strength and presence of mind of George Mack, a Negro porter, she would have been killed. Mr Mack was not lynched’.

Gorgeous piece of music by Ayo Bankole, brought to us by the awesome @rebecaomordia.bsky.social

Totally agree. It’s a fantastic musical achievement. @cellocorb.bsky.social even includes a fragment from Sappho 😮

A general rule of life: @cadebellaigue.bsky.social is always, *always* worth listening to

A general rule of life: @cadebellaigue.bsky.social is always, *always* worth listening to

Yes, this is about morris dancing….but what a great essay! It includes the connections to early C20 music and to the suffragettes; explores the role of women; the gendered dynamics; & the complexities of navigating ‘Englishness’ whilst remaining progressive.

My daughter & I have both had severe long covid for 5 yrs. Out of the blue, in the last couple of weeks, my daughter’s heart/POTS issues have started to resolve. She’s now able to sit up most of the day, rather than lying. Life changing! So happy! HOPE & ✊ to all going through it #longcovid #pots

Congratulations to @slagstadk.bsky.social on the publication of this important new book on the history of trans medicine

Another brilliant piece by @rhaplord.bsky.social on the richness of premodern African history. Here, tracing intensive farming technologies, such as West African rice cultivation, dating back centuries.

Reposting to 🙏@mainewitch.bsky.social for her work on the British composer Kalitha Dorothy Fox (1894-1934). @mainewitch.bsky.social also has a great thesis on the “Forgotten Tales of Women Composers” who studied at the RCM in the interwar years. So important to excavate these unknown women.

Women’s Institute statement: ‘Transgender women are welcome to join the WI and to participate in any WI activities in the same way as any other woman.’ Often patronised and stereotyped but from the start (1915) @womensinstitute.bsky.social fought for change: equal pay & women’s role in public life.

‘it was probably the most disturbing scent I've ever smelled’ - here’s someone who’s never tried one of my ‘Sniff it n Bin’ aromatherapy blends 😂 [‘Sniff it ‘n’ Bin it’ is the bedbound aromatherapy studio I started in the early days of long covid 🧪 👃 🗑️]

“Hallie Quinn Brown’s skills as an elocutionist taught thousands of Black people the power of spoken language during a period in which they were not expected and welcomed to be a political force. We are still in that period.” By Dr. Mia L. Carey.

Wow - Hallie Q. Brown, daughter of enslaved parents. She graduated from Wilberforce University in 1873 with a BSc. In the 1880s she became dean of Allen University, Columbia. Thank you @proenzacoles.bsky.social for introducing me/us to such inspiring people

One of the very wealthiest people in 4th century York was a young woman with African ancestry. The luxurious, imported items in her sarcophagus included a bracelet made of elephant ivory.

First it was the ‘compassionate’ Arnold Bax chasing [grooming?] the teenage Harriet Cohen and now this! I just had a look and unbelievably, the 2001 Grove entry for Gabriel Faure STILL says this:

It's a lot to ask of a spaniel www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

This is fascinating: DNA analysis of two 7th century cemetries in Southern England found one person from each had a recent ancestor from West Africa.

Reading about Harriet Cohen who won an award aged 18 for being the most distinguished musician at the RAM! But UGH not enjoying the relationship with Arnold Bax stuff. He was infatuated & began to write to her from their 1st meeting when was 16. He was newly married and…[brace yourselves] 1/2

C18 and C19 music people - fascinating references to music (unknown to me) in this lovely letter from Euphemia Toussaint. She would have been c. 13 yrs old (and died the following year). She is pleased to have Telemaque’s overture (Destouches?) & is now practising ‘The White Lady’

Excellent blog here by leading scholar @manionjen.bsky.social on the importance of queer and transhistory in the current political climate (with reference to the USA)

The sophistication of Swahili townships amazed Vasco da Gama when he reached there in 1498: buildings of “stone and mortar, with windows and terraces like those of Spain.” The architecture of medieval coastal East Africa is explored in another fascinating blog from @rhaplord.bsky.social

Roberta Cowell (1918-2011) A British racing driver from Croydon, she was captured in Germany during the WWI. Underwent gender reassignment surgery in 1951. Would be interested to read her autobiography some time. Thank you @edrybicki.bsky.social so much for telling me about her - she’s new to me

Christine Jorgensen (1926-89) - one of the first Americans to have gender reassignment surgery (1951-2). Such a brave woman

Raphael Elizé was a WWI veteran from Martinique & veterinarian trained in Lyon who became France’s first elected Black mayor in 1929. In WWII Elizé worked with the French Resistance but was deported to Germany’s Buchenwald concentration camp in 1945 where he was killed.

HAS ANYONE COME ACROSS THE WORD ‘ARTIGI’? I think it might be my first mountweazel 😮😮!! First came across these fake words in dictionaries when I read Eley Williams’s The Liar's Dictionary. Artigi’s in the scrabble dictionary. (Don’t judge I’m housebound & this is as exciting as things get.)

TV adaptations of C18 and C19 novels which cast black actors, to the ire of certain newspapers, would not have been that surprising to contemporaries. (Thinking too of Thackeray’s Vanity Fair)

The launch will explore the learning presented within the course and bring together a range of music industry experts to discuss their experiences of promoting women’s music.

C17 Henrique Dias ‘ requested the enslaved blacks who served with him be freed should have "all the rights and privileges of white units".

Susan Toots in Dombey & Son is one of my fave C19 fictional women. As her husband says, ‘If ever the Rights of women, and all that thing, are propertly attended to, it will be through her powerful intellect’

Wildlife ponds - little representations of natural renewal. Our pond, similar age, now has tiny newts! I know! HOW DO THEY EVEN GET THERE? HOW DO THEY KNOW???

Meet the British Ladies’ Football Team - 1895

Forty percent of racist rioters are domestic abusers. Forty. Percent.

Ooh look at this #girlhood #histed #childhistory

I love this point about passive v. active listening and the shifting experience of the listener

This looks terrific

Jane Freer (c 1740-1790). Brought up in London’s Foundling Hospital, Freer (who was blind) composed keyboard sonatas. #histed #disabilityhistory #womencomposers I’m sure you’ll know it @deeplyclassical.bsky.social, but finding this useful for little known C18 composers: youtu.be/WYMjTnmT6rM?...

My worst #longcovid symptom has been inability to tolerate new stimuli - even seeing friends/family etc. But I’ve just seen my brother for a 2nd time AND this time said hello to his lovely dog. First time I’ve seen or stroked a dog in 5 years. Utterly brilliant ✊ to any going through similar

There are many ‘Ethel’s in British 19th century music we should know about, not only Ethel Smyth. Ethel Barns, Ethel Boyce, Ethel Leginska, Ethel Barnby… This here is Ethel Harraden (1857-1917) & her beautiful song ‘Rainy Days’. Performed live with baritone Stephan Loges in Mozarteum, Salzburg.

#histchild people: this book looks so interesting. And, given today’s announcement re lowering of the voting age in the UK - timely

Why does no one ever advocate for legislation to tackle Oxbridge’s enormous endowments? Under the Endowed Schools Act 1869 schools’ endowments could be appropriated for the benefit of the whole community. If even the Victorians discerned ways to redistribute institutional wealth, why can’t we?

Harriet Gibbs Marshall - what a distinguished musician and extraordinary life. Interested to learn that she studied piano in Paris. In 1894 she gave a piano recital to an integrated audience in Arkansas.

Our yew tree has decided to change sex. I didn’t know some plant species could! Though applying ‘male’ and ‘female’ to plants always seemed ideological to me - labelling & perceiving the natural world through a fixed patriarchal lens. Delighted to find there’s a whole rich field of queer ecology. 😀

So pleased my favourite pianist @aoyarzabal.bsky.social is now here! Antonio has released a number of beautiful albums featuring women composers, and has exciting projects in the pipeline. BIG recommend - do follow 😀

Thank you @deeplyclassical.bsky.social - I hadn’t come across Tania Leon before. Now enjoying listening to, and learning about her. www.tanialeon.com/about/biogra... Biography | Composer & Conductor Tania León

How did I not know Ingmar Bergman was a Nazi? Shocking news www.theguardian.com/film/2025/ju...