To think women are just as good musicians?

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Watching the New Year’s Day concert in Vienna (on bbc2) and around 95% of the orchestra is male.

What’s the reason for this? I’m fairly sure at very lower levels of playing music women outstrip men?

You’re very BU.

Of course there are plenty of women who are just as fine musicians as men but maybe, on the day, all they could find were men who were available. Don't read so much into it.

Unless you play music with your genitalia I cant imagine what relevance it has? Of course women are as good , but it's a human thing not a sex thing.

I haven't got a lick of musical ability but that's got nothing to do with being female.

You aren't serious surely ?

www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/women-in-leadership/2013/oct/14/blind-auditions-orchestras-gender-bias

There are issues with gender bias in music

Aren’t they salaried musicians for the orchestra though? It just seems such a shame there’s clearly such a gap.

Thank you Hula - that’s what I was after! I’m not saying I think men are better, I’m saying the opposite! Why are there so few women when clearly they are just as good.

It's a good question OP, not sure why you've had some funny answers Whenever I've been to see orchestras there's always been a fairly even split or even maybe in the favour of women from what I can recall.

Oh thanks for that article. It doesn't really surprise me at all I did wonder if the peripatetic nature of it was part of the reason.

This was something we were discussing when the concert was on - if you google Vienna Symphony Orchestra, you will find a range of discussions about its 'social conservatism'. Historically it has employed only a small number of women.

I do wonder why .. maybe because guys do it and persevere with it for female attention? Please dont shoot me if you think this is stupid! Its stuck in my head how this guy learnt the guitar 'to get the chicks'.. women tend to fancy band members and musicians in general.. i dont think i have ever heard a man say he wants a musician whereas i have heard maby a times women with musician on their ideal partner/bf wish list or the type they find sexy.

Lots of professional chefs and successful hairdressers male too.. male teachers seem to progress more in schools, too.

The Vienna Phil has long had this problem. They didn't allow women in the orchestra at all until relatively recently, and at first it was only because they couldn't find male harpists.

It's going to take decades for the men to retire and more women be allowed to join up.

There is also the issue that being a professional orchestral musician is not very compatible with motherhood, which can restrict opportunities. Other orchestras do it better, but the Vienna Phil is still in the 19th century.

It's not you - it's them. The VPO is the most sexist orchestra in the world and the reason I no longer watch.

www.nytimes.com/2019/12/23/arts/music/women-vienna-philharmonic.html
www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/features/all-white-on-the-night-why-does-the-world-famous-vienna-philharmonic-feature-so-few-women-and-ethnic-1915666.html

There is definitely a bias when it comes to appointments, but also orchestral musicianship isn’t a particularly family-friendly occupation, so that’s also a factor.

Certainly nothing to do with competence.

The Vienna Phil has long been notorious for this. It’s not just them, as a pp has said, but they’re a particularly egregious example.

And the pp who said ‘maybe it was only men available on the day’ needs to realise that major orchestra concerts aren’t like casual pub football leagues where whoever’s available togs out!

The Vienna Philharmonic is notorious for this. Look at almost any other orchestra and the gender balance will be far more equal.

Many orchestras audition potential new members behind a screen so their person is irrelevant when they are being assessed for a place in that orchestra, and they are judged only on the quality of their playing. I think that is a very good idea.

And guess what? The orchestras which do that saw a rise in the percentage of women in them from 5% in 1970 to 30% in 2000. I expect it might have been more, but the turnover of orchestra members is quite low.

The Guardian article is wrong about their reasons for doing it in the first place, though: it was not to do with gender bias. It was to do with nepotism: orchestras were noticing that people the conductor knew or taught were very much more likely to be employed in the orchestra than ones he (or sometimes, rarely, she) didn't know. Blind auditions were designed to try to get rid of that bias.

I'm usually one to think that sexism is over-blamed for differences in employment outcomes. But in the case of orchestras, having read that Guardian link above, I do think outrageous and preventable bias is the biggest factor.

My goodness the first few replies...as if there being so few women is by chance.

The Vienna Philharmonic is renowned for its misogyny and racism. Think there aren't many women in the orchestra? How many BAME players can you see? The Vienna Philharmonic was Hitler's favourite orchestra ... and it's so sad that almost 100 years later there's so little change to the make up of the orchestra.

Lot of travelling? Not compatable with kids?

WTAF happened to feminism in the first few answers.
Christ alive.

It's certainly a problem in opera, but in a slightly different way. Women far outnumber men so there is much less work to go round. Also, in classical opera there are far less principal roles for women.

The VPO are really awful for it.

I used to play in an orchestra, strings tender to be fairly equal, but everything else was male dominated.

The VPO had problems with foreign men until recently let alone women. They are a long way behind other orchestras in this respect. There are a lot of reactionary conservatives amongst the philharmoniker ranks.

Because sexism. I don't think this is a great mystery, honestly.