Sex-Stereotyping of Musical Instruments

In my study regarding the sex-stereotyping of musical instruments, one individual keeps popping up as a viable resource.  Hal Abeles, the head of the Music Education Department at Teachers College of Columbia University has been in the forefront of researching this topic.  In 1978, Abeles, in collaboration with Susan Yank Porter, first published a study in the Journal of Research in Music Education entitled “The Sex-Stereotyping of Musical Instruments”, in which they reported a series of studies the two had conducted over the previous couple of years.  There were 4 main studies: Study 1 inestigated musical preferences adults had for children.  Study two surveyed a population to place specific instruments on a scale from most feminine to most masculine.  The third study investigated the instrumental preferences of children in grades K-5.  The final study explored procedures used to present instruments to preschool children.

            The first study mentioned, that of adult musical instrument preference for children surveyd 149 adults aged 19 to 52 chosen from public school and church-related activities.  From the applicant pool alone, it can be determined that music played some part in these individual’s lives simply from the culture they were derived from.  The format of the survey was as such:

“Your fifth grade son/daughter has indicated in a school survey that she would like to play a musical instrument… “ (Note: Half the surveys said son, while the other half said daughter.)

The applicants were then asked to rate a series of instruments in order that they would prefer to encourage their respective child to pursue.  The instruments were as follows (these same instruments were used in each study)

Cello

Clarinet

Drums

Flute

Saxophone

Trombone

Trumpet

Violin

The results of this study was quite revealing as to gender stereotypes.  Participants in the study were  1.8 times more likely to give a higher preference for clarinet for a daughter than for a son, and 2.24 times more likely to encourage a flute to their female children.  On the other hand, a boy would have Three times the chance to be encouraged to play trumpet by his parent(s) than his female classmates.  Drums were significantly less appropriate for girls than boys (ratio of 1:4) Trombone also was significantly more “masculine” , but was not particularly popular for either boys nor girls. (boo!)

Since parental involvement plays a HUGE role in participation in a music program, let  alone selesction of musical instruments, it was quite interesting to find such a bias towards the more “masculine vs. feminine” instruments. If the parents don’t want their sons to play flute, what motivation would a student have to pursue that instrument?  (It doesn’t matter that some of the most prominent flute players are male).  The entire influence of parents on sex-stereotyping of musical instruments is essentially what is keeping the bias alive.  It is an unending cycle between judgement of peers and parents.  The parents, when they were students, saw the trumpet and drums as masculine instruments.  Not wanting their children to be anything but normal to spectacular, they refrain from encouraging, even discourage, the cross-gendering of instrumental participation.  This new generation now has bias coming from two angles: they have that prejudice from their peers as well as the judgement from their parents.  This sense of tradition keeps our culture in a stuck community, with no real ability to break free without social persecution.

Speaking of role models, the last of Abeles’ studies in this series of research looked at the perspectives of musical stereotypes in young children.  There were three groups of children surveyed.  One group was introduced to the instruments just by hearing the sounds each instrument makes as well as pictures of each instrument  without any one in the picture.  A second group had people playing the instruments with corresponding gender-stereotypes.  The third and final group included video of gender-crossing instrumental playing.  The results of this study showed there was no real significant preference of instrument by gender on the part of the children.  The bias is not in the children – it is by their reaction to peers and parents.

 A few years back, Sesame street had a female monster, Zoe, start to play the trombone.  Now, for my paper, I’m going to have to find a way to get segments of the TV show to see how they presented the trombone and if there were any sex stereotyping mentioned (in 3-year-old terms, of course). 

From my perspective, I had to develop a tough outer shell to cope with being the fat kid at school. To do this, I “hid” behind a masculine instrument, the trombone.  Never mind that it was cool and the only instrument to change its size while being played, it was BIG and played LOW NOTES. (I’m pretty sure that if my dad had a tuba laying in the basement I would have picked that up as a first instrument.)  Playing the trombone made me different. It made me “special”.  I played all the time, and best of all, I played LOUD in rehearsal and my conductor loved it (in many cases I was the only one or one of two trombones in the band.)  Playing the trombone became a part of me, like any musician would identify with their instrument.  However, part of my reasoning was that it made me feel less vulnerable.  (It also could be the fact I could poke someone from 3 feet away… just saying….)

Abeles conducted another series of studies that was published in 2009 to see if 40 years had changed the sex stereotypes.  When he came to present his findings at Westminster Choir College earlier this semester, he proved that there were still issues of gender-crossing with instrumental preference, but the ratios were significantly smaller. (I will be addressing the difference of these studies in my paper, but the actual report on it is difficult to find online without paying a $25 fee.)

The research I am doing in my BHP course this semester is rather like the third study  Abeles conducted.  I will be surveying three 5^th grade classes at 2 different elementary schools (providing they don’t back out on me) regarding their preference for instruments.  Depending on what group they are in, they will be given one of these prompts, and asked to rate their level of preference to learn, as well as asked a series of follow-up questions.  

Hopefully the results of this survey will be ready in time for my presentation on the last day of class! :-)

The URL for the study online is: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3344880

Short Essay on the Importance of Women Conductors

The musical world includes many different facets: one of those being conducting. It is a fairly new example of the conducting world, as it came into existence in the early twentieth century with the famous composer-conductor that started with Wagner. Leaders of ensembles existed before this, but the idea of someone with a baton leading the group silently through the music started with Berlioz, who started what became the modern tradition of the conductor. People like Bernstein drew this idea of a conductor who is flamboyant and handsome.[i] All of these ideas of who a conductor should be describe men and not women. Beliefs exist that women are not independent enough to lead a full ensemble.[ii]

Women have been struggling to break into the music world since before the Renaissance. Recently women have been accepted as performers in many facets: including but not exclusive to operas, orchestras, and choirs. Conducting is the last area of the music world women are still struggling to break into. They are making some headway in choral conducting, but orchestral conducting is still hard for women to be taken seriously. Margaret Hillis, a famous woman conductor, started off getting a degree in composition at Indiana University. She wanted to get a degree in conducting, but her professor told her a woman has no place in conducting. After seeing her conduct a choral concert, he said “You are a conductor, but there is no place for a woman in orchestral conducting.”[iii]

Women were already thought of as being inferior to men, and trying to lead a group of men was unbecoming of a woman. The social status of women created this ideal in men and women alike. A famous pianist Amy Fay wrote about a concert she saw in Germany in which a female, Alicia Hund, conducted a symphony she composed. “All the men were highly disgusted because she was allowed to conduct the orchestra herself. I didn’t think myself that it was a very becoming position, though I had no prejudice against it. Somehow, a woman doesn’t look well with a baton in her hand directing a body of men.”[iv] This happened in the last nineteenth century, and women still struggle with this image. Margaret Harris blames this on the “daddy’s little girl” syndrome. People see women as daddy’s little girl which portrays a lack of strength and independence, two very important qualities in a conductor.[v] Mary Brown Hinely has defined the image people need to have if they want to be conductors. “A conductor needs to be a commanding personality as well as impeccable musicianship to hold the attention and respect of an orchestra.”[vi] The traditional idea of “feminine” is not aggressive or assertive, soft, and non-threatening. This is the exact opposite of the idea of someone who needs the authority of a large symphonic orchestra, which most of the women talked about have dreamed to be someday, and have succeeded.

Women find a way around this by creating their own ensembles. JoAnn Falletta is one woman who has made this option possible for women. Falletta has directed the Bay Area Women’s Philharmonic in San Francisco since 1986. This is a group created by two women devoted to playing music written by women.[vii] It is groups like this that help women create names for themselves in the musical world in all capacities: performers, instrumentalists, composers, and conductors. Women can either create their own ensembles or go abroad where positions as conductors are more readily available. Ethel Leginska, the first woman to conduct in Carnegie Hall, has conducted the Paris Conservatory Orchestra, the London Symphony, the Berlin Philharmonic, and the Munich Konzertverein. Antonia Brico, another famous woman composer has conducted the Berlin Philharmonic, as well as other orchestras in Germany, Poland, and other Eurpoean countries.[viii]

As time goes on, women continue to break barriers and create careers for themselves in conducting. Beatrice Brown is the first woman to sign a contract with an orchestra. All of these women discussed in this essay have created an environment where women are becoming more and more accepted as conductors. Marin Alsop has recently accepted the role as the conductor of the Bournemouth Symphony in England. Prejudices still exist in some cases, but are becoming fewer and fewer as time goes on, and more and more women take on conducting roles. Margaret Hillis, mentioned earlier in this essay, has definitely noticed a difference in the acceptance of women since her professor told her she had no business in the conducting world in the 1940s. JoAnn Falletta, also mentioned earlier in this essay, hopes that the role of gender will one day dissipate completely from societal roles of conducting. Shelley M. Jagow says it perfectly when she says, “conducting is an extremely competitive and difficult field for either gender to cussed in, and it is imperative that society begin to recognize, value, and support talented women conductors in a profession still harboring discrimination and the burden of tradition.”[ix] People need to stop looking at women as inferior to men and start equating the talent women bring to conducting to that of men. We as a society need to realize how different women and men are, and value the differences women bring to the table in every facet of music, including the world of conducting.

---

[i] Kay Lawson, "Women Conductors: Credibility in a Male-Dominated
Profession," in The Musical Woman: An International Perspective, ed. Judith Lang
Zaimont (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1991), 3:197.

[ii] Kay D. Lawson, "A Woman's Place Is at the Podium," Music Educators
Journal 70, no. 9 (May 1984): 47, accessed January 3, 2011,
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3400741.

[iii] Kay Lawson, "Women Conductors: Credibility in a Male-Dominated
Profession," in The Musical Woman: An International Perspective, ed. Judith Lang
Zaimont (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1991), 3:199.

[iv] Shelley M. Jagow, "Women Orchestral Conductors in America: The struggle
for Acceptance--An Historical View from the nineteenth Century to the Present,"
College Music Symposium: Journal of the College Music Society 38 (1998): 131.

[v] Kay D. Lawson, "A Woman's Place Is at the Podium," Music Educators
Journal 70, no. 9 (May 1984): 47, accessed January 3, 2011,
http://www.jstor.org/stable/3400741.

[vi] Maty Brown Hinely, "The Uphill Climb of Women in American Music:
Conductors and Composers," Music Educators Journal 70, no. 9 (May 1984): 43, accessed January 3, 2011, http://www.jstor.org/stable/3400740.

[vii] Kay Lawson, "Women Conductors: Credibility in a Male-Dominated
Profession," in The Musical Woman: An International Perspective, ed. Judith Lang
Zaimont (Westport: Greenwood Press, 1991), 3:204.

[viii] Shelley M. Jagow, "Women Orchestral Conductors in America: The struggle
for Acceptance--An Historical View from the nineteenth Century to the Present,"
College Music Symposium: Journal of the College Music Society 38 (1998): 133.

[ix] Shelley M. Jagow, "Women Orchestral Conductors in America: The struggle
for Acceptance--An Historical View from the nineteenth Century to the Present,"
College Music Symposium: Journal of the College Music Society 38 (1998): 140.

Deification of Pop stars

One of my sources is an article published in Popular Music and Society by Linda Lister regarding the deification of women in music. Her article discusses three specific types of  "divas;"  put bluntly, the 'actually vocally talented ones,' the ones 'famous for the visual performance,' and the 'renaissance performer,' who sings, plays instruments, and writes music. She named a mascot for each group - 'the voice' is personified by Barbara Streisand,  the 'visual diva' is personified by Madonna, and the 'renaissance performer' is personified by nearly everyone who performed at the Lilith Fair Festival. She briefly discusses the cyclic resurgence of this 'deification' phenomenon occurring every hundred years,  first in the mid 19th century with the popularity of bel canto, then in the mid 20th century, specifically with Maria Callas as the main 'diva' of the time period, and currently (rather, as current as 2001) the women in popular music are elevated to 'diva' status.  

The first thing I noticed upon reading this article was how clear the author's opinions of each of the specific groups were. It was almost unsettling seeing her loaded words. In specific, "....recognized primarily for sheer vocal talent, however wisely or inanely utilized,' when discussing the prima donna, and 'this category may reveal the most positive prospects for women in pop music. Instead of simply being celebrated for their physical or vocal beauty, .......also revered for [intellectual gifts.]  And discussed how 'uniting female singers in a music festival may help to combat the prima donna stereotype of 'bitch.'   She later goes on to categorize several of the 'Divas' of this generation.  

She labels Whitney Houston, Mariah Carey and Celine Dion as the 'Prima Divas,'  and pokes fun at the media's portrayal of Mariah Carey, which at some point went so far as to say that her vocal range exceeded the range of a piano. She also criticizes Celine Dion, saying that she "seems to suffer from an identity crisis," saying her vocal effects emulate the style of Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey, even going so far to say that her voice sounds 'eerily similar' to Barbara Streisand, and that her performances are too intense and 'self-flagellating,' yet are distinctly uniform and lack subtlety, blaming it on 'an inability to fully express herself in something other than her native tongue.' Lister nearly insults her fans/audience saying that despite how 'little personality" is present in her voice, her fans 'still react to the visceral thrill of ornate vocal feats.' "Her premature exit from the industry may have ensured her position as a deified diva" simply because she never petered out, much in the way that Britney Spears did. 

Very little is positively said about any of the women in the 'prima diva' category, except for the given that they have vocal ability. 

The 'Madonna's receive little more than acknowledgment of their image-based fame. She flippantly describes Madonna herself as constantly reinventing herself for the sake of her audience.  She discusses her highly sexualized image, and I have a difficult time discerning rather she is stating this neutrally or negatively, although"Only she knows if her exhibitionism is sincere self-expression of carefully engineered self-promotion' seems to speak volumes. She seems to respect Courtney Love at least, for growing from the death of Kurt Cobain, rather than 'going the way of The Bell Jar,' but clearly does not believe she is a worthwhile musician, going so far as to quote someone's description of her voice as " the amelodic howls of [a] caterwauling ex-stripper.  Harsh. Just harsh.

After this - she discusses the 'Liliths,' which is a group Lister clearly has a great respect for. Rather than her largely negative critiques of the members of the other groups, her words about these renaissance women are significantly more supportive, saying that "the Lilith festival served as a celebration and collaboration of female artists who sometimes hve trouble finding a forum in the male-dominated world of rock music." I did find it a little funny however, that in discussing Jewel, who Lister labeled as one of the "Liliths," she spent a fair amount of space on her appearance and musical ability, as she previously said that these women were the ones who were talented in all the musical areas. 

I would have felt worth mentioning in this paper the origins of the name of the Lilith Fair. She did mention that some religious figure called for a boycott of Lilith Fair in 1999, however she neglected to discuss why the boycott happened, which makes Reverend Jerry Falwall seem like a misogynist jerk. While he may have actually been a misogynist jerk, he called for the boycott because of the demonic connotations of the name Lilith. In some translations of various religious texts, she's a demon, akin to a succubus, and goes around generally being a bitch.   In other translations, she was Adam's first wife, before Eve. She was created the same as him, rather than being taken from a piece of him, and as such refused to be subservient to Adam. Now, of course, we can't have women doing THAT, so she either got kicked out, or shacked up with the angel Samael (depending on your translation) and refused to come back.  It would seem that Lister would most likely go with the 'shacking up with Samael' translation, as doing so effectively catapults her to a more 'godly' status,' and the entire point of her paper deals with the 'deification' of women in the pop music world.  Maybe she figured we already knew this, but personally I would have put things in context.

Is the "Lilith Cult" a form of Goddess worship? Maybe - certainly the amount that people fawn over these 'divas' is a bit ridiculous and can border on fanatical, but maybe those that subscribe to the 'cult' mentality are lacking a more realistic version of what they believe their diva represents to them. If I respect Madonna for being so free and open about her body and being a sexual being, perhaps I am sexually repressed and lack a healthy dose of respect for my body.  I applaud her optimism that the deification is starting to remove the negative stigma attached to divas, however I doubt that it's the case. As any Saturday morning/after school cartoon will tell you, it's usually better not to meet your idols, because they're almost all jerks and full of themselves.

Review of Article about Women Conductors

Lawson, Kay D. "A Woman's Place Is at the Podium." Music Educators Journal 70,
no. 9 (May 1984): 46-49. Accessed January 3, 2011. http://www.jstor.org/
stable/3400741.

This article discusses different women who have been successful as conductors. It discusses obstacles these women overcame to become as successful as they are. Lawson does a great job in defining what these women went through throughout their careers and things that stood in their way. For example, Margaret Hillis was told that would "sink" in she tried to enter the world of orchestral conducting, so she was told by her teacher to start conducting choirs instead. She did just that, and now conducts the Chicago Symphony Chorus, which gives her a chance to conduct choral music that combines with the instrumental music she grew up loving.

Throughout the article she also goes through and highlights specific images women must face as obstacles of conductors. Margaret Harris says women are looked at as “daddy’s little girl,” meaning they cannot do anything without daddy to support them. This gives an idea that women cannot be independent strong women, which is imperative to standing in front of a large ensemble. This point is very true to how women are portrayed as authority figures, which a conductor is. Lawson brings up many other good points like this.

She also discusses ways in which women have overcome these obstacles. She gives examples of the opportunities available to women, but does not give many examples of how women can get to the positions they want. Overall, this article brings up the issues women face in a way that is accessible to anyone, not just women. Lawson also explains different ways in which specific women have broken barriers and overcome obstacles, but there are much more obstacles out there women face.

Margaret Hillis Conducting in 1956

http://community.ascap.com/_Wife39s-Aria-There-You-Go-from-LIMA-BEANS-1955-by-Douglas-Townsend/AUDIO/829199/27521.html

This is an audio of soprano Halley Gilbert singing the Wife's Aria from the one-act opera LIMA BEANS by Dougles Townsend. This is an important opera in that the premier of this opera was conducted by Margaret Hillis in 1956. She got her first big successful breakthrough in 1954 when she was asked to prepare a chorus for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Two years later, despite the ideas of her composition teacher, she conducted an orchestra in a premier of an opera. She overcame the odds set forth by her that women could only conduct choral music and had no place in the orchestral conducting world. She was one of the first women to prove women can conduct orchestras just as well as men can.

Music is from Venus CD cover

http://www.flickr.com/photos/agatendo/3346488009/

This is a link to a picture of a CD cover "Music is from Venus". This CD cover depicts three different types of successful women: an astronaut holding a keyboard, an artist holding a guitar and a microphone, and a mother holding a child that has drum sticks. The portrayal that all of these women have the ability to be musicians is an important statement to make. All of these women have been successful in some capacity and can also be musical. I believe this statement says women can really do anything, and shouldn’t be looked down upon because they do music. Even though society doesn’t always look at women who are musicians as prostitutes, this would have been a nice political statement to make when this was a relevant idea. It is nice to see a change in how women musicians are being viewed. However, all of these women are projected with a similar body type: small waists and distinguished features. This portrays all successful women as being the societal ideal of beautiful. Even this women empowerment CD cover is marketing the “sexy” woman, not a real life woman who may not have the perfect curves. It gives off the idea of a successful woman who wants to be a musician must have the “perfect figure” to enter this world to music.

Picasso's "Guitar Lesson"

We have seen a lot of depictions of music lessons in visual art involving women being taught music by men, often in a very idyllic setting. Also, most of the visual works of art we have seen that deal with this have been done in a "realist" fashion. I remembered looking at this painting by Picasso when I was in high school and discussing the grotesqueness and vulgarity of it. Here we see a woman giving a young girl a "music lesson." I think that this is a totally different take on the attitudes we have seen thus far about women in music in general. Comments?