Orchestral cuts because of diversity
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English Touring Opera drops half its orchestra in controversial move, citing ‘increased diversity’
English Touring Opera (ETO) has dropped half of its orchestral players in a push for diversity.
At least 14 musicians have been told they will not be booked for the 2022 ETO tour, many of them long-running members of the orchestra.
The ETO has attributed the changes to prioritising “increased diversity in the orchestra,” something that’s in line with “firm guidance of the Arts Council.”
“There has been an understandable outcry from Musicians Union members in response to this news today,” the Musicians Union (MU) wrote in a statement on Friday (10 September). “It comes at an especially devastating time for the freelance community, and musicians in general, with so many struggling with little work and income during the COVID-19 crisis.”
In their response, the MU describes being “appalled” by the ETO’s decision and outlines that, “while the MU lauds efforts to increase diversity in the workplace, the Union is adamant this should be achieved fairly and legitimately, not by ‘sacking’ half an orchestra.”
Musicians are hired by the ETO as freelancers, so can be dropped from the opera season-on-season, but many have played with the company for many years so consider it a permanent fixture.
The Arts Council, which provides funding to the ETO, has responded by saying that they did not advise the opera company to fire musicians as part of their work to increase diversity in classical music.
“We did not instruct the English Touring Opera to send this letter,” the Arts Council has said. “We are now in conversation with ETO to ensure no funding criteria have been breached.”
The ETO announced hiring 12 new artists in the freelance orchestra for the spring 2022 tour on Friday.
“Following a recent round of auditions, we are looking forward to welcoming 12 new artists to our freelance orchestra for our spring 2022 tour,” the opera company announced.
“We hope that you will welcome these musicians to your towns and cities, and enjoy the musical qualities they will bring to this production.”
They did say, “This means that there may be musicians with whom you may be more familiar from ETO performances who will not be with us on this particular tour.
“We want to thank them for the seasons they have toured with the company and for the collective contributions they have made to ETO’s success over the years.”
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Interesting question… A white blind musician vs a POC… Who gets the gig?
Me/rry/Christmas
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@lufins-dad said in Orchestral cuts because of diversity:
Interesting question… A white blind musician vs a POC… Who gets the gig?
A white male from Appalachia vs an Obama daughter - who does our culture consider to be more oppressed?
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When was the last time you went to see a live opera performance?
Was “diversity” among the orchestral musicians ever a factor in your decision to go see an opera?
Perhaps the Arts Council should write diversity among the composers into its funding guidelines? Then the operas will have to scramble to find operatic works composed by non-Caucasians.
Quick, can you think of any operatic work composed by a non-Caucasian?
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I can, but I have to dig into “Peking operas”, where all the composers and musicians playing them are also very “non diverse.”
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@kluurs said in Orchestral cuts because of diversity:
Treemonisha
And it’s freely available on YouTube!
Link to video -
Guess this means they will be dropping the English Horn and French Horn from the group?
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You thought it couldn't get crazier?
One such example has been the attack on the “blind audition” process. In blind auditions, orchestras evaluate prospective players by listening to them behind a screen, allowing the judges to select musicians without respect to race, gender, or other nonmusical characteristics. Recently, this audition innovation — which was widely credited with reducing gender bias in orchestra hiring — has come under attack at some of the nation’s top orchestras, on the grounds that it has resulted in the hiring of too few non-Asian musicians of color.
Equally dangerous — and less discussed — is mounting discrimination in the employment of artistic leaders. This is occurring not just during candidate selection but as early as the job-posting phase. It is evident in most conducting postings, particularly for assistant-conductor positions (i.e., the first leg up the ladder for young conductors), which now contain some variation of the phrase: “Members of underrepresented groups in classical music, particularly members of [racial group x, y, z], are encouraged to apply.”
Perhaps the most egregious example yet comes in the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra’s (BPO) recently announced posting for a “Conductor Diversity Fellow,” a position whose responsibilities — if one reads the job description carefully — are virtually identical to those of an assistant conductor in peer orchestras, but for one key difference: that the posting explicitly solicits applications only from those who “self-identify as members of historically underrepresented groups in American orchestras, including but not limited to African-American, Hispanic, Native American, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian, or Pacific Islander descent.”
Two major races are conspicuously left off that list of “underrepresented groups,” and the subtext is clear: No whites or Asians need apply.
The BPO’s posting is one of the most brazen attempts by an American orchestra to expunge classical music’s history of racism by using the tool of racism. It also might be the first to clearly contravene federal equal-employment-opportunity rules, which state that no job posting can discourage an applicant to apply because of his or her race. But without any apparent backlash forthcoming from orchestra members, board members, or audiences, this is unlikely to be the last.
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Meritocracy is a tool of whiteness and will be a relic in the new future we are writing.
