women in (classical) music

[mousmous]

fight between my sisters.
watched eurovision last night and saw that the austrian brass band in the interval was very male heavy.
at college/uni it's about 50/50 in brass section but in orchestras it's more like 95/5 (if that, the most famous austrian only 'allowed' women to join after a court case recently).
one sister and I are at the 'angry' stage whilst our younger sister is in 'they didn't practice enough to get through a fair selection procedure'.
fair selection my arse

[mousmous]

your thoughts?
brass instruments are physical but there are excellent female musicians, especially on french horn which (ironically) is the physically most demanding of all brass instruments.

[SanityClause]

There's a bit about this in Malcolm Gladwell's book, Blink.

American orchestras apparently now audition blind, because of the ingrained sexism towards female brass players.

[YokoUhOh]

Is it the Vienna Phil which still only admits male players, or is that relic gone for good?

[mousmous]

austrians do, too. but there are rumours that the piano player identifies females by playing a cerain way...

[mousmous]

vienna philharmonic, in theory they admit women but only have a handful.

[HarpyBeard]

I don't think anyone would deny that until very recently many orchestras were immensely patriarchal institutions - the Vienna Phil is a particularly outrageous example, having not appointed a woman to a permanent position until 1997. Their membership is still only 6 or 7% female, and they weren't conducted by a woman until some stage in the last couple of years. I would say that was a combination of Austria being a socially conservative country in many ways, and an unusually chauvinistic orchestral culture.

[YDdraigGoch]

Likewise though, woodwind at youth orchestra level is very female biased, especially flutes and clarinets.

[mousmous]

bassoon and clarinets and percussions are (equally?) physical and there the female representation is much higher.

[SanityClause]

I have mentioned the blind auditions to people in the music world, who have given a knowing smirk, so I expect you are right.

It's obviously a good thing for male players to be able to only actually have to compete against half of the eligible candidates.

Get your little sister to read Cordelia Fine's Delusions Of Gender, if she really believes that women are inherently worse brass players than men.

I would also suggest that a musician's hours may not be family friendly, so unless she had an understanding partner, a woman may not be able continue an orchestral career if she had children.

[mousmous]

my sisters both are orchestra musicians. both brass.
it works for them with a combination of school/nursery and grandparents.

[SanityClause]

Well, exactly. How many of their male colleagues are doing that juggling? I would think a male player could more easily expect to find a partner willing to support his career by taking on childcare responsibilities.

[mousmous]

thanks for the literature suggestions.

[OrlandoWoolf]

There is something about conductors as well - rare to find female conductors. The "usual" discussion about a career like this and family came up.

www.classical-music.com/blog/why-arent-there-more-women-conductors-jude-kelly-leads-discussion-southbank-centre

[yallsexist]

If their arms can't lift up these instruments, they shouldn't be expected to play them.

[PuffinsAreFictitious]

yall dear, do you actually read threads before dribbling on them?

[yallsexist]

It just stands to reason that a heavy instrument like a french horn will have more males that play it. I'm not saying females can't play it, I'm saying that quantifiably more males will.

[mousmous]

but french horn is the one which has more female professional players than any other brass instrument in an orchester. even though it is said to be the most difficult to play.

[PenguinsandtheTantrumofDoom]

What bollocks. We aren't talking about bench pressing like a navy seal. I see you have been deleted on a number of other threads today Yall. That must be sad for you.

[mousmous]

yes it's physically demanding to play a brass instrument (and other instruments) but if's very achievable by women.

[mousmous]

alison balsom is one of the best ever baroque trumpetists (different league all together)

[OrlandoWoolf]

And the flute is so so light - far too small for a bloke with such big hands

Those drums are so heavy.

The double bass, cello.

yall Why do you think there are so few female conductors? They only have to hold a baton after all?

[uglyswan]

Historically, brass instruments were not part of classical or pre-classical musical ensembles, but were recruited, when necessary, from military ensembles, which of course were all male, and - the classical music scene, being what it is (reactionary for the most part, especially in Austria) - the bias has lingered on. The same applies to percussion instruments. Besides which,
There is also a quite fascinating cultural history of what instruments were considered "seemly" for women: for example, a pervasive narrative surrounds the supposed distortion of the face caused by playing brass instruments, making them unsuitable for women, who always had to look beautiful and composed. One recurring story that crops up over and over again in the history of music aethetics, for example, is Athena's rejection of the aulos upon catching sight of her reflection while she was playing it, which has frequently been cited as an example of musical instruments as tools of social and especially gendered demarcations. Richard Leppert's "The Sight of Sound: Music, Representation, and the History of the Body" has some other, very interesting examples.

[uglyswan]

Btw, the argument re phyical strength is complete rubbish. Yes, the french horn is one of the heavier instruments. Which is one reason why composers -even Wagner! - never score it for long passages and always factor in long breaks to give the musician (male or female) a chance to rest. So in practice, playing a lighter instrument such as the violin is frequently a lot more grueling because you have to play continuously, with very few and only very short breaks. And you certainly don't bench press a french horn, or hold it under your chin with one hand. Although I wouldn't mind seeing that...

[mousmous]

thanks for more reads!
very interesting about the beauty aspect.
with 'physically difficult' I don't (just) mean the weight of the instruments. trpets are small after all.
it takes a lot of muscle (face/diaphragm) and breath. a 'loud' passage can leave you breathless like a 400m sprinter.

[LurcioAgain]

Ugly -it's not that it's heavy (ex horn player here). The open notes are very high up the harmonic series and therefore very close together (in comparison to, say, the trumpet) so it's absolutely exhausting for the lip muscles. (I am not aware of any research suggesting that men have super-strong lip muscles compared to women ).

There's a great contemporary report of Vivaldi's orchestra in the foundlings' hospital by an English traveller, where he comments on how all the instruments are played by teenage girls, "even the french horns."