Here is a quick quiz for Women’s History and Awareness Month (WHAM): Try to name four great classical composers who are women.

If the curve is set to two, would you still pass the test? If so, congratulations. Feel free to take a week off classes. If not, don’t beat yourself up. But do make sure to spend “An Afternoon of Violin and Piano Music by 19th and 20th Century Women.”

The concert, which will take place at 3:30 p.m. on March 13 at the Tarble Arts Center, will feature compositions by four classical composers performed by two professional musicians from the Charleston area.

Elaine Fine, a violinist, and John David Moore, a pianist and associate professor of English, have been playing together for well over a decade. This will be their third year performing in honor of WHAM.

Though none of the composers are particularly well known, Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel is probably the most notable. Her brother, Felix Mendelssohn, was, in Moore’s words, “one of the top biggies in 19th century composition.”

Fine said Hensel’s work was never published for fear it might undermine the work of her brother.

“For a woman of her class to have that music published was considered a way of dissing her brother as a breadwinner of the family,” Fine said. “So she is a victim of the upper class. And now, finally, her music is being published and people realize that she was a very, very fine composer.”

But, Moore added, “a lot of things that Felix Mendelssohn did were first pioneered by his sister.”

The concert will also feature compositions by Louise Farren, who Moore said “was roughly a contemporary of Beethoven and very influenced by Beethoven,” and Germaine Tailleferre, the only female member of a group of avant-garde composers in the early 20th century called Le Six.

Fine and Moore found their fourth piece, “Sonata in D major, Op. 26,” by Dora Pejasevich, in Booth Library. They had never heard of Pejasevich before finding her work at Eastern, but once they played it they realized it was something worth sharing with the entire community.

Researching rare compositions and working on them is one of the best parts of Fine and Moore’s work together.

“Most of the fun of doing this is actually the rehearsal,” Fine said. “We enjoy the performances, but most of all we enjoy learning the music.”

As performers, the duo brings combined decades of experience. Moore has played piano “pretty much since sixth grade,” and used to perform with the Eastern Trio years ago.

Fine teaches at Lake Land College, but her main work is as a professional musician. She studied flute at Juilliard and was a professional flutist after she graduated. Then, at 32, she made the switch to violin. Fine said it was a difficult transition.

“I had to start from the beginning and be extremely patient with myself, make mistakes and embarrass myself on occasion,” she said. “Now I’ve been playing for close to 20 years and I think I’m as good a violinist as I was a flutist.”

She no longer plays the flute.

“The wrist position on the flute and the wrist position on the violin are at odds with one another. So holding the flute with my wrist back effects my violin position,” Fine said. “I much prefer playing the violin to playing the flute.”

Fine said this concert is important for everyone in the community.

“I think it should mean a lot to not just women, but men as well,” she said. “It brings an awareness to music that had previously not been acknowledged as a great accomplishment, as great art.

Doing concerts like this makes it possible to hear music that, otherwise, people wouldn’t hear.”

Dave Balson can be reached at 581-2812 or dsbalson@eiu.edu.