Into the Heart of Darkness

[akuyura]

Here is an interesting account of the prevalence of sexism in major symphony orchestras. Unlike some feminists, I do not hence condemn classical music as a whole as an instrument of oppression. But nonetheless, it illuminates on the various ways people read into art forms in "gendered" terms

Comments

[amaltheas_horn]

'How will women conductors and musicians enter the orchestra if we maintain these patriarchal images, endlessly repeated by the recording industry, of the conductor saving the "fatherless society" with "revelations" and fertilizing the "virgins" with "truly experienced tones" in the act of "orchestral coitus"? Will something of our artistic heritage be lost? Do we want to maintain these images?'

I can't imagine saying such things about my own work, or any work that I have enjoyed, in a superior gendered context like that.

[akuyura]

Music is highly sexual in nature. And therefore it is almost inevitable that the problem of sexual dynamics would creep into the issue of this artform even more than others.

There is a sense that the orchestra (and perhaps a rock band) channels that primal sexual energy through itself during the performance. I have myself experienced it, it was overwhelming.

Which makes this matter more pressing and complex than "look, they're sexist pigs" that one is tempted to use as with other work situations.

[amaltheas_horn]

I think I've used the term channeling to describe the difference between the truly talented musicians and the skilled. Just watching, it was apparent that there was something more than mechanical movement producing this music. I didn't think of it as a channeling of primal sexuality at the time, it seemed to be born of Beauty to me, but I will think on this again.