US orchestras maintain block on black players
OrchestrasA survey by the League of American Orchestras shows that ethnic minorities now account for 21 percent of their musicians.
However, just 2.4 percent are African-American.
The needle has barely shifted in a decade. It was 1.8 percent in 2013.
Read the survey here.
Think about the consequences.
pictured: the late Michael Morgan, a lamentably underrated conductor
Has anyone calculated the ratio of self-identified conductors who are white male to white and make conductors who have conducted a top tier US orchestra (Chicago, Philly, Cleveland, Boston, LA). And then taken a similar survey of self-identified [non white] male conductors to [non white] male conductors who have conducted the above orchestras? I wonder, sincerely, if race need be a factor, would the proportions be similar? Say 2%?
It would be interesting because, as with rappers, race can project skewed stats.
And yes, Maestro Morgan is brilliant!
Sadly, Maestro Morgan is not of present tense. He died in 2021.
When the irresistible force of positive discrimination meets the immovable object of screened auditions it is invariably the former which loses.
Of all areas where affirmative action is (arguably) necessary, affirmative action in classical music is the most ridiculous and most irrelevant.
We know that Blacks excel in music, from jazz to pop, so if they are under-represented in classical music, it’s because they prefer something else.
If Wynton Marsalis decided he’d rather found and head his own Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra, instead of auditioning to be principal trumpet at the New York Philharmonic, does Lincoln Center have a moral obligation to defund his Jazz Orchestra and to force the NY Phil to recruit Marsalis?
To artificially impose a quota for Blacks in classical music is like to tell Black kids to play hockey or curling or synchronized swimming instead, just to bring the quota up.
Straw man alert! Nobody ever proposed a quota. Try arguing honestly.
What does the word ADDRESS mean in these recommendations from the survey report?
Address the low representation in the following areas:
Black or African American, Latinx/Hispanic, and American Indian and Alaska Native people in all artistic roles, particularly within larger budget orchestras.
Women in conductor and music director roles, particularly within larger budget orchestras.
People of color in top executive and governance roles.
Nonbinary people in conductor, music director, top executive, and governance roles.
Tell that to the Detroit Symphony
Wrong. Orchestras are constantly criticized for not looking like the communities they serve. To look like the communities they serve would involve a quota.
Can’t wait to read some absolute screed by E Rand about how black people must therefore be genetically less inclined towards classical music or something wild like that.
Up from 1,8% to 2,4% in ten years is in fact a 33% rise… I’m not sure if there is a “block” here. Perhaps there simply aren’t enough black kids in the Baltimore suburbs who picked up the flute in the early 2000 to make it into the orchestras.
That is an unfair and inflammatory headline: it suggests deliberate discrimination. Given the blind audition process it is hard to “block” black players. And, frankly, none of the musicians I know would have any reason to try to do so. Classical musicians are one of the more leftward-leaning groups I know (admittedly not so much as actors).
What, exactly, are the consequences? What an orchestra looks like is irrelevant. But if one insists on being angry about it, be angry at the black community for failing to produce viable candidates for orchestral positions. There are no excuses, where there is a will there is a way .
“What an orchestra looks like is irrelevant.” Amen
There aren’t many thoughts on this topic that haven’t already been written in various comment sections, but it’s worth remembering that these chairs are tenured appointments. There are still players in orchestras that started their tenures before the bill of civil rights was law.
The makeup of an orchestra isn’t just reflective of the many years before someone’s career began, it is the result of educations that may have began as early as about 1940. Of course a more diverse orchestra would be great, beautiful, and more like the city in which it’s based, but the priority must always be placed on artistic excellence and the experience of the music itself.
The demographics of orchestras will become more colorful with time, but it will take time. All attempts to greatly rush it to a result will do more to destroy the industry. Managements will feel pressure to hire particular musicians based on race and will attempt to bend audition procedures to find that result. They will also feel some heat to attempt getting rid of tenured players who aren’t the right color or gender.
Of course all of this seems farfetched now, but once the baby boomers have all retired and there aren’t so many auditions happening, a very frustrated new generation of auditioning musicians is going to feel squeezed and will use any tactics they can to make space for themselves in the field they were encouraged to pursue and spent tens of thousands of dollars betting on working out.
The 2.4% figure doesn’t mean anything unless we also know the percentage of black musicians who take auditions. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that 2.4% of all orchestra musicians are vegetarians or born again Christians or drive Chevrolets.
The only way to get more blacks in orchestras is to have more take auditions which obviously means getting more black youngsters interested in classical music and giving them all of the support and mentoring needed to be successful. There are no shortcuts, nor should there be.
Drummerman nails the essential statistical issue: you cannot form any meaningful opinion about the 2.4% figure unless you also know the percentage of available candidates. If that is at or near 2.4% then there is no story, and certainly no interesting headline, here. The issue would switch to increasing the % of available candidates above 2.4%, which is not only less attention grabbing, but also likely far more challenging and complex.
This comment is correct. You have to know the percentage that applied. Philip Ewell made the same mistake in his claim that music theory is racist. Also, how can blind auditions be discriminatory.
Someone could have seen the the candidate and ran to the audition people and told them that there is a person of color behind the screen. If that’s not viable, I have other silly idea.
Cool story. Now do the NBA, or the hip hop world. No screened auditions there, btw. I guess it must just be just open discrimination.
Whenever people bring this issue up regarding orchestras, they refer to some abstract entity like “The Classical Music World” or “American Orchestras”. But the abstract entities don’t hear the auditions – they are heard by flesh and blood human beings, many of whom I know personally and went to school with. They are almost uniformly politically progressive and generally very cosmopolitan and non-racist people. If you know racists who are hearing orchestral auditions, name names or shut the fuck up
“There is no blocking of any particular group from entering classical music other than a lack of interest and the incredible discipline needed to succeed.” That’s pretty much the bottom line now isn’t it.
This is a ridiculous and quite frankly slanderous headline. Maybe it is because American blacks are not all that interested in western art music. Asian-Americans for whatever reason have adopted western art music as their own and will likely be the future custodians of an art form that originated in Western Europe. The members of major orchestras like Philadelphia were once dominated by Italian, Jewish, and German immigrants or their first generation decedents. Not any more; the 21 percent ethnic minority is likely comprised mostly of Koreans and Chinese with a culture of promoting education and hard work which are key ingredients to succeeding in mastering orchestral instruments. There is no blocking of any particular group from entering classical music other than a lack of interest and the incredible discipline needed to succeed. I suspect the paucity of blacks in American orchestras is due to the former and not the latter. As an aside, I played in a community orchestra that was led by a marvelous African American conductor for more than 50 years. He was not only a fabulous musician but tremendously charismatic. He was never able to recruit more than one or two African American musicians during the 30 years my time overlapped with his. He definitely faced obstacles 50 years ago; no doubt about it; but those have mostly been removed and he incredibly was never bitter about it.
Norman, is “block” your choice of word or is it the League’s? Classical music has no Orville Faubus or However,, there is a professional standard required and everyone, no matter their background, must be proficient enough to function at that admittedly lofty standard. The professional standard may be defined somewhat differently from place to place but that is true in any occupation; there is an unavoidable and necessary element of subjectivity involved high-level professional pursuits. That’s life.
Using the term “block” implies a willful act and by your employment of the term are being unnecessarily provocative.
Professional orchestras are painstakingly built over time with one goal in mind: excellence. Youth and community orchestras are where a wider range of players have an opportunity to cut their teeth and decide whether to get serious in pursuing a vocation as a top-tier player. Not all can, will, or should.
Blind auditions are the purest, most incorruptible form of merit-based hiring in ANY profession. If not “enough” musicians from some particular demographic group aren’t hired, the problem clearly lies elsewhere. Cry less, practice more.
Your headline is part of the problem Norman. It is misleading and very disappointing. Win the blind auditions like everyone else, if we still end up having them. There are appointments without auditions happening left and right. Management would love to appoint without audition or even much of a trial. Appointment without either is disrespectful to every other person in the ensemble that prepared, paid for travel, lessons and whatever other time and efforts were put in to learn the ridiculous excerpts we have to play for these auditions. (Excerpts are another conversation entirely.)
At least go through the formality of an audition. Blind as they may be there is always the subjective to deal with on the panel. There are great players chosen through auditions. Are they always the best orchestral players? Not even close, again another conversation. Just take the audition! Many places are now holding chairs aside for fellowship chairs, something that should have happened a long time ago for students of all races and genders. Do the fellowship and then get the job through the audition for the open spot if there is one.
Norman, please do better. Your headline is insidious.
Garbage headline. Orchestra hiring is glacially slow. There are so few openings in any given orchestra. People hold onto these chairs forever.
SD’s headline in today’s world can be interpreted as perhaps a case of sarcasm or tongue-in-cheek. If so, words like “The LGBTQ Also Possibly Blocked by US Orchestras Too” should have been added to the heading.
http://www.bruceduffie.com/morgan.html
An interview with Bruce Duffie and the person in the photo, the late Michael Morgan. Worth reading apropos of this page entry – and not full of statistics!
This issue is practically never discussed with understanding of what has gone on in American music for over a century. Bulletin: Black musicianship and Black musicians have been the drivers of American music, and through it the prime influencers of music worldwide, for that whole time! But this has taken place, understandably, through the genres that they pioneered, and the others that descended from those or were reshaped by them, and not so much through pursuit of the genres imported from white Europe. This is a success story, not an oppression story!
So, OK, only 2.4% of LAO players are Black, less than a quarter of what the number would be if it were proportional to the population. Next question: what proportion of musically talented Black Americans prefer symphonic classical music and concentrate their aspirations on it? If that proportion is as high as, or higher than, the proportion in other groups, then the low results are evidence of barriers and discrimination. But is it?
I agree with some of these comments. It is hard to know what 2% means when we don’t know how many black people are taking auditions. Chairs change over slowly. 33% raise is good!
But, as someone who went to conservatory, played chamber music, and is now in an orchestra, there is racism in every level of our industry. Anyone who doesn’t fit into or understand the subtle cues, is usually on the outside, regardless of race. Add to that the fact that anyone who isn’t wealthy or coming from a comfortable home has a lot of catching up to do, means decks could be stacked against you from the start. Most suburban white middle and high schools have decent orchestra programs. Do Black neighborhoods get the same funding and priority for the arts? Do Black kids get the same passes that white kids do if they miss a lesson at Juilliard? I don’t know, but I’d be willing to bet there is a difference in how people are treated.
Black people love classical music. You can be any race, any ethnicity, any sexual orientation to love classical music. That is the most important part of what we do. Any of us musicians who are not Black need to recognize the privilege we have. We may have disabilities, face sexism, be short, but we cannot understand what it is to be Black in such a European based art form.
I believe in blind auditions and less screening of resumes. But getting the job is not the one show of how our industry is doing with racism. Racism is everywhere, big and small. Maybe we can all try harder to be more supportive of each other.
Naturally there are black people who love classical music, since, as often needs to be pointed out, black people are not a monolith. Classical music is for anyone and everyone who wants it. But it would be disingenuous to ignore the utter dearth of classical music among the more visible aspects of what is loosely termed “black culture.” It’s not, generally speaking, what black kids are listening to, unless they’re directly involved in it. It’s not discussed on “black Twitter.” “Black” publications give it short shrift; when it’s discussed at all, it’s almost inevitably in the context of “not enough black people in classical music.” I suspect that the real reason that people are wringing their hands over not-very-meaningful statistics is simply that classical music represents an even smaller sliver of “black culture” than it does of “white culture” (at least in the U.S.A., where classical has always lagged every other genre). Which is fine! People like what they like. Difference is not the same as disparity. It would be similarly ridiculous to expect or demand white participation in rap/hip-hop proportional to the U.S. population.
It must be said that white kids, generally speaking, are not listening to classical music either, unless they are directly involved in it.
Yes, I said as much! Classical music is the merest sliver of the American music “market”; and black listeners/musicians are an even tinier sliver.
No disagreement with your point on how this is a problem that starts years before an audition. It is an issue of education, income, and associated culture. Of course this is also why initiatives to positively discriminate for race at professional auditions is infuriating.
https://twitter.com/CitizenFreePres/status/1670138619078537216
There is also an obvious block on white rappers.
There is no “block” on white rappers. You just have to be good enough; the skill level is very high and the competition is fierce.
Stipulating that the League of American Orchestras survey result is correct and that “just 2.4%” of orchestra musicians are Black, this does NOT mean that American orchestras are “blocking” Black players. This strikes me as more of the absurd “disparate impact” nonsense that is generating so much destructive mush in what little remains of our civil society today.
In fact, there isn’t an arts institution in American that isn’t bending over — backwards and even forwards in some cases — to recruit Blacks to virtually every facet of their organizations. It has been thus for most of my adult life, and any suggestion to the contrary is a lie.
There are any number of reasons why Blacks are not taking to classical music, to mastering orchestral instruments, and/or gravitating as performing musicians to symphony orchestras. High atop the list is the almost total absence of classical music programs within the dumbed-down curricula of our increasingly horrendous public (read “state-run”) schools and not a few private institutions that are, themselves, seeming bastions of a now multi-generational denigration of Western history and culture in our society.
Ultimately, however, whatever outside encouragement or inspiration they might or might not receive, if Blacks are “under-represented” amongst classical music performers and orchestral musicians, it comes down to the choices made by Blacks themselves relative to developing both a knowledge of and love for classical musical traditions and the requisite musical skills to make their participation in these fields a reality. That, today, Blacks are excelling in other artistic and entertainment media speaks volumes about the ultimate power of individual choice when it comes to assessing group representation in any given field.