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In the male-dominated profession of composition, women may find themselves having to surmount extra hurdles because the industry and society itself circumscribes their role. These challenges stand between women and their creative goals, and it may require great courage and long periods of time in the wilderness of non-acceptance before success at any level becomes possible. I stopped composing for almost twenty years. When I returned I discovered that I was not alone in having abandoned my chosen path. I found many women composers historically whose careers had not progressed with the same levels of exposure as their male counterparts, and many who had also stopped composing either temporarily or permanently. This dissertation and portfolio takes the form of a creative feminist autobiography and is presented as a website in order to facilitate the process of storytelling through a multimedia format. By composing The Poetess, a music theatre work for actors and an instrumental ensemble; Out of the Snowstorm, an Owl for string quartet; Mycorrhizal Ecology for two pianos; What The Living Do for solo piano; I Lay Down By The Riverside And Dreamed for large instrumental ensemble; and Let Me Speak for solo clarinet with poetry, I represent my own and other women's lives creatively, covering themes including abuse, bereavement, transformation, and love. These works form a living enquiry into women's experiences. Through an imagined dialogue between myself and composers Ethel Smyth, Ruth Crawford, Avril Coleridge-Taylor, Enid Luff and Laurie Anderson, using their own words taken from their various autobiographies, letters, journals and interviews, I investigate shared issues in women composers' lives and their struggles for creative self-expression. These stories show how it is ultimately possible to find one's voice as a woman in music, and how I, in particular, returned from the wilderness, and became a composer again.

This thesis comprises six new musical works composed between 2008 and 2015: ‘Struction (how I attempted to get the thoughts in my head into your head using only five instruments, five instrumentalists, metronome sound and MIDI') for amplified ensemble and pre-recorded soundtrack (2011); ‘My Life in Ventriloquism' for solo clarinet and pre-recorded soundtrack (2012); ‘Nightmusic' for solo violin (2012); ‘Replaceable Parts for the Irreplaceable You' for ensemble, pre-recorded soundtrack and video (2013); ‘Espial', a video work featuring string quartet (2014); and ‘Elbow Room' for amplified ensemble, pre-recorded soundtrack and video (2014). The works are presented in this thesis as musical scores (and other performance materials), accompanied by audio-visual documentation of performances. As a whole, these compositions reflect a period of practice-as-research into the role of metapraxis in musical performance and how it can be used to help convey non-musical thought through instrumental music. A commentary on this portfolio of new compositions begins by discussing two influential works — Mauricio Kagel's ‘Match' (1964) and ‘Failing: A Difficult Piece for Solo String Bass' (1975) by Tom Johnson — before examining each new work in detail in order to explicate the research and creative processes that led to their composition, to exteriorize a personal working practice and to document the reflection-on-practice which has furthered this research. The commentary details how I was able to write music on a variety of topics, including authority, technology and place, and concludes with some ideas for further research.