AKARSH SHEKHAR
Women And
Musical Instruments
Are there instruments for men and instruments for women ? This question can lead us to the root of many behaviors in our society and in the history of recent centuries . It is not necessary to explain that gender issues have intervened and continue to intervene in the majority of activities and decisions of daily life . As if it were a transparent lens that varies everything , discrimination and habits related to sexual categories affect all aspects of life . Also , the music , and much more than we can imagine at first . Without going into the exciting labyrinth of tensions between genre and musical situations , we will dwell only on some examples related to playing instruments .
Instruments and musical specialization , especially when practiced professionally , has been an almost exclusively male affair . Until a few decades ago , the cases of female instrument players were very rare ( much earlier they were singers , dancers or instrument players considered simple or non-professional ), so much so that before the 20th century few could provide the name of a female violinist , bassoonist , cellist or trumpeter ( we are sticking with classical music here ). Paradoxically , if we now review the proportions of orchestral instrument students in conservatories , we will find a clear female majority . What happened ? What has changed ?
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