- This event has passed.
The Piano Women @ The Butterfly Club
May 9, 2025 @ 6:30 pm – 7:30 pm ACST
How many piano women can you name? Fancy a bit of Mendelssohn? (Fanny Mendelssohn, that is.) How about Lady Gaga? Or jazzy Mary Lou Williams? Let’s drop a few more names – Chinquinha Gonzaga, Alicia Keys, Carole King, Winifred Atwell, Fannie Bloomfield Zeisler.
Singer, pianist and raconteur Emma Knights criss-crosses four centuries’ worth of pianos, and the history-making women who play them. With meticulous research and an amazingly broad playlist, her mixture of curiosity and virtuoso musicianship is a winning combination. As she tells these women’s tales, sings their songs and plays their compositions, it’s as if you’re sitting in her snug, being entertained by this warmly theatrical musician.
Some topics may surprise you: Musical instruments too erotic for women to play. The perils of piano-tuning (Lock up your daughters!). Playing Chopin saved a woman’s life in concentration camp. How to snare a husband. Yuja Wang’s crazy high heels. The history of women and pianos is both comical and fascinating, the way Emma tells it. If you saw Emma Knights’ “The Piano Men” show in Melbourne in 2019, you’ll be ready for the quirky, musically immaculate and laugh-out-loud funny slant she brings to the piano in history.
“The Piano Women” premiered on Thursday 8th August 2019 in the #pianodrome in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, this show received rave reviews from the International Piano Magazine and audiences alike. This will be the first performance of The Piano Women in Melbourne since its premiere.
Directed by Adrian Barnes with music direction by Pat Wilson.
Prices
- Full $45
- Concession $40
- Member $38
- Group (6+) $38
- Broke Butterfly $15
