Female Chauvenist Musicians

The idiots in my music history class are at it again.

For background, I should point out that I'm not a music major.  I'm acing the class, I'll have you know.  But these are juniors and seniors who have been studying music for years, and some of them are taking the class for the second or third time.  Our TA is fantastic.  He's funny, clearly brilliant, and used the phrase "ontological query" on the first day of class--in response to a comment about the world's largest bottle of ketchup.  We get along just fine.  I do not get along fine with the rest of the class.  They annoy me.  They are Welsh carrots (thank you, Stephen Fry, for providing me with that little bilingual bonus there).  I don't mean that they're idiots in terms of grades or the ability to write a coherent essay or whether or not they can remember something that our TA said five seconds ago (they are, but that is not the point in this case). 

What set me off today was something that is a sad fact of life which is unfortunately not often dealt with in a constructive manner.  We were discussing the role of women in music in the Baroque and how it is or is not comparable to today.  After a fairly depressing listing of the reasons why it sucks to be female in the music fields, Steve asked if we could think of a reason why it was "awesome" to be female in the field.  The first and only thing anyone could come up with was that while guys all look essentially the same in their tuxes, the best part about performing is getting to dress up and look pretty.

SERIOUSLY?!?!?!?!?!?

They giggled over how great concert dresses are, and how it's always great to go to some girl's recital and see what she picked out to wear.  I fumed quietly in the background.  Steve eventually turned to me and said, "Caitlin, I'm pretty sure you have an opinion on this..."

Damn right I do!

Issue number one:  Yes, we are judged on our physical appearance.  It's not fair, but that's how society works, there is a double standard whether we like it or not, and really there's very little we can do other than ignore it to the best of our ability (technically speaking exploiting it shamelessly is also an option, but that never turns out well in the long run) and prove ourselves on the basis of our talent and dedication to the art.  While being pretty is nice and all, it should not be the focus of our lives, nor the trait on which we base our self-worth.  Alondra de la Parra is beautiful, but a) she practices and b) I'm pretty sure she'd be more pleased with compliments on her conducting than on her hair.

One girl said, in defense of the pretty dresses thing, that her life goal is ultimately to be a 50s housewife.  She likes to cook and clean.  That's fine.  I'm a pretty good baker, and my apartment is in fairly good order.  That does not mean that I judge myself, or expect that others will judge me, on the quality of my pumpkin muffins or whether I've scrubbed the kitchen floor this past week (they're fantastic, and I haven't).

I come from the math department, where the grand total of female faculty is a whopping 0 and any woman student is automatically assumed to be a future teacher who will only be taking enough math classes to get her degree and then happily retreat to the realm of third-grade mathematics.  To wit: I was in a math class once as the only female.  It was spring semester, so everyone started out in six layers of bulky sweaters.  Once spring hit properly, I was in a bit of a whimsical mood, so I wore a skirt, heels and a blouse that actually fits.  They stared at me as if to say "You have boobs.  What are you doing here?"  The point I'm trying to make is that if we're too pretty, we're assumed to be ditzes who get by on the strength of eye-lash fluttering skills.  Those fancy recital dresses will work against you more often than for you. 

Issue number two: Really, that's all you can come up with for why it's awesome to be female in music?  How about the music itself?  When Brahms's 4th Symphony or the Bach Magnificat starts echoing around the Hall, no one cares whether the musicians are wearing tuxes or skirts.  During the violin solo at the end of Scheherazade, no one gives a shit if one of the most beautiful pieces in the world is being played by a man or a woman.  Offstage it may be more of an issue, but the music is the ultimate goal and it's worth it.

I understand that history has not exactly spoken in favor of women in music, or in any other field.  Progress has been made recently, although we've still got a long way to go--look at the proportion of female musicians overall versus the proportion of female musicians at the top of the profession.  Sexism is not specific to music.  It's certainly not worse than in any other area, and it's a lot better than a lot of fields (just google the numbers for the STEM fields.  It's depressing.)  But seriously, ladies, the fluttery discussion of who's going to wear what is not helping the cause.  Equally important, it's annoying me, so cut it out.

I WILL have more commentary on this later, mark my words.

--C.