Establishing the female classical canon - a unique opportunity?

[eschiss1]

You may be right, and Google suggests you are; probably a poorly-chosen example. I know that when I saw that the Binghamton Philharmonic was planning on performing his 6th later this year, I thought "that may be the first time that a Bruckner orchestral work has been played in upstate NY in ages." (And I may be wrong about that, too.) I do think it's safe to say that the orchestral repertory here is thinner, on the whole; when Sibelius 3 was performed (very very well...) here by a Ukrainian orchestra not long ago that also felt like a rare event even though the work itself is hardly a rarity of itself. Etc. (More of an actual rarity would be the two works by Mel Bonis programmed lately - one recently, one coming up - in chamber concerts in my small city, but those are often better in regard to repertoire than orchestral ones.)
Edit: undeniably the larger cities- e.g. NYC, which I visit occasionally- are better in this regard- though not a patch on London, in my opinion (though I've only been there twice. But then I was born near NYC...)

[John Boyer]

I do think it's safe to say that the orchestral repertory here is thinner, on the whole; when Sibelius 3 was performed (very very well...) here by a Ukrainian orchestra not long ago that also felt like a rare event even though the work itself is hardly a rarity of itself.

It's funny you mentioned Sibelius 3 because that would be a rare event in my parts too. Indeed, it occurs to me I have never heard in concert a Sibelius symphony other than #2, which is trotted out again and again here to the exclusion of the others.  Of local Bruckner I've only heard the fourth, though I am pretty sure some of the others have been done, but that's over a span of 20 years. 

Anyway, with an established composer like Sibelius being treated almost like an unsung -- at least in the provinces -- it does make you wonder what hope real unsungs have, even when windows of opportunity are opened like female programming. The former conductor of Springfield told me that he wanted to do Reger but said that every time he did something out of the ordinary he could count another two or three hundred empty seats in the hall.