Philip Peters asks me: >Could you elaborate a bit on Talma (sounds like a Dutch - or, rather, >Frisian name) & Clayton? Do they achieve the same level? Of course in this >- I mean the last - century there have come increasingly more women to the >fore. Louise Talma, an American, studied with Boulanger. She's of the Samuel Barber generation. She's neo-classicist, with the same kind of energy as Piston. Laura Clayton's a composer, probably in her 50s now, who takes off from Perle and Druckman. Talma has a few recordings. To me, this is some of the finest music of the century. Clayton has none, so far as I know. I've encountered her work only in live performance. Steve Schwartz