The Female Composer Initiative
Past / Present / Possible
BEYONDPRICE
A wider musical world.
An invitation to discoverBeyond what has been heard.
Beyond what has been written.
Beyond what has been remembered.
Beyond what has been imagined.
01 / An open invitation
There is more
than we have heard.
More than any canon can contain. More than any history can preserve. More than any single idea of greatness can measure.
Beyond Price is an invitation to look again—to encounter voices beyond the familiar, not in place of what we already love, but alongside it.
Because a wider musical world gives us something profoundly personal: choice.
The freedom to be drawn toward power or tenderness, complexity or simplicity, the monumental or the intimate—not because we have been told what matters, but because we have learned to listen for ourselves.
And perhaps that is where an artistic voice begins.
On March 8, 2020, a search for a concerto by a woman composer led pianist and Beyond Price founder Ningjialu Liu to the music of Florence Price.
One discovery became many.
After nearly twenty years at the piano, the encounter opened a question she had never thought to ask:
How much music had I never thought to look for?
The performance traveled farther than expected. As concert halls around the world fell silent, its recording continued to find listeners online—connecting a musician, a composer, and strangers across distance and time.
What began with one voice became a search for many.
Beyond Price began there.
Florence Price — Piano Concerto
8 March 2020 · Texas Medical Center Orchestra
Watch on YouTubeVideo loads from YouTube when you press play.
03 / Possibility
Discovery changes
what is possible.
A work cannot be chosen before it is encountered.
Beyond Price creates encounters—with music, histories, artists, ideas, and voices that may lie beyond the familiar.
Sometimes through performance. Sometimes through research, education, conversation, collaboration, or creation. And sometimes through forms we have yet to imagine.
We do not ask what everyone should choose.
We ask what might become possible when there is more to choose from.
04 / Featured project
upcoming
A recital program does not have to begin with familiarity.
Macao Cultural Centre · Small Auditorium
05 / Discover
Who will you
find next?
A living index, growing over time.
Explore the A–Z06 / Ideas
Worth carrying
forward.
Writing, conversations, listening, and ideas worth carrying forward.
The first collection is taking shape.
Explore IdeasAn open beginning
What will
you find?
Every discovery begins somewhere.
A name. A work. A performance. A question.
Follow what speaks to you.
See where it leads.
