Klarinet Archive - Posting 000016.txt from 2007/03

From: "dnleeson" <dnleeson@-----.net>
Subj: [kl] An interesting point of view
Date: Fri, 02 Mar 2007 12:25:50 -0500

The following well-written article by Justin Davidson appeared in
Newsday quite recently. It may be seen directly using the
following link: http://tinyurl.com/2hsazt. This topic,
continuing and ongoing sexism of the Vienna Philharmonic, has
been discussed on this list several times, but Davidson's
position pretty much says, "Time's up, fellows. Get moving or get
out."

Dan Leeson

---------------------------------------------------

Newsday
Vienna is slow to change its tune
JUSTIN DAVIDSON March 2, 2007

In the symphonic music world, the Vienna Philharmonic
defines
prestige. It performs annually at Carnegie Hall, its concerts are
almost
always sold out, its New Year's celebration in Vienna is
broadcast around
the world, and having stood on its podium is a conductor's
equivalent of
Olympic gold. The Philharmonic is Austria's preëminent purveyor
of
Austria's most visible export: classical music. But it is more:
To many
people around the world, and in its own corporate estimation, it
embodies
the quintessence of the Western musical tradition.

I have heard and written about the orchestra many times, but
I will
not be attending Friday's Carnegie Hall performances - or
Saturday's, or
Sunday's - and it may be years before I review it again. A
decade after
it supposedly committed itself to entering the 21st century, I
believe
that the Vienna Philharmonic has relinquished its claim to
serious
consideration as a dynamic cultural organization.

Almost exactly 10 years ago, on the eve of another U.S. tour
and under
pressure from the Austrian government, the orchestra struck down
the
statute in its bylaws forbidding women from becoming members.
That change
permitted Anna Lelkes, a harpist who had been playing in the
orchestra in
an unofficial capacity for many years, to become a full-fledged
member.
She has since retired.

In the decade since that change in policy, the orchestra has
replaced
about 40 people, and still has a solitary female member - another
harpist,
Charlotte Balzereit - and 136 men. Even if every one of the
women now in
the long and blockage-prone pipeline made it into this most
rarefied of
classical clubs, they would still only number five by 2010. The
Citadel,
the South Carolina military school that reluctantly admitted its
first
woman in 1996, has a far better record of adaptation.

When challenged on this issue, the Philharmonic answers that
it is
making a good-faith attempt to increase the number of women in
its ranks,
and offers a number of "buts": 1) Most members stay in the
orchestra for
life, which keeps the rate of turnover low. 2) The organization
is
dedicated to a fundamentally historical mission, so it need not
reflect
contemporary mores. 3) Its highest concern is the refinement of
its art,
and if the price to be paid for that is a sluggish creep toward
equality,
so be it. Finally, the orchestra's identity depends on a complex
of
highly local traditions, so any new member must not only be a
brilliant
musician, but also someone capable of imbibing and integrating
with the
orchestra's spirit.

Mary Lou Falcone, a New York-based spokeswoman for the
Vienna
Philharmonic, and one of the more indomitable women in a world
historically controlled by conservative men, told me to be
patient, that
the orchestra works on its own time scale. "What I see is the
openness of
the Vienna Philharmonic to have auditions that include everyone.
They're
preserving the best of their tradition and a sound that's been
there for
160 years, a distinctive sound, which most orchestras today don't
have."

But the geological pace of change is not merely a
regrettable obstacle
in the relentless pursuit of quality. It is product of a
narrowly
preservationist, antiquarian philosophy, which fetishizes sound
at the
expense of spirit. The composers in the Vienna Philharmonic's
pantheon
were all disturbers of the peace, and they railed against the
city's
recurring fondness for the status quo. Beethoven was a liberal
idealist, a
radical egalitarian and artistic revolutionary who would have
been
revolted by the claim that performing his forward-looking,
constantly
renewable music required an inflexible reverence for custom.

Most orchestras are conservative: They keep reheating the
same
masterpiece soup, seasoned with the occasional novelty. But
some - the
Los Angeles Philharmonic, for example - aspire to flexibility,
excitement,
leadership and collaboration with the creators of today. Few
major
ensembles have quite so hidebound a philosophy, and none so
monochromatic
and homogeneous a membership, as the Vienna Philharmonic. (To
take one
top-tier example, women constitute 40 percent of the New York
Philharmonic.)

The world's most important orchestra treats the symphonic
repertoire
the way re-enactment societies treat the Civil War: as terrain
for the
obsessive pursuit of historical correctness. There is a place
for this,
of course. We should be grateful for the efforts of so many
dedicated
people who put their expertise and time to the service of
faithful
reconstruction of the past. Obscurity becomes part of these
organizations'
charm.

But if we judge an orchestra's quality by what it
contributes to the
vibrant, dynamic musical culture that keeps the symphonic
tradition alive,
rather than by the transparency of its string sound, then the
Vienna
Philharmonic would occupy a dusty corner.

The orchestra's defenders make one additional argument: It
is a
completely private association, which receives no public funds,
and so it
does not actually have to change at all. Aside from its symbolic
value to
the Austrian nation, however, it is also an association made up
entirely
of Austrian civil servants: the tenured membership of the Vienna
State
Opera Orchestra. For those musicians, membership in the
Philharmonic
amounts to a second job. It is difficult for an American to
understand
why the glacial pace of change in a group so tightly (if
indirectly)
linked to the government causes no apparent public embarrassment
except in
the liberal Green Party.

The Vienna Philharmonic cannot keep women out forever,
especially
since it professes not to want to. Even a group that holds
nostalgia in
such high regard has its progressive contingent. Inevitably, the
orchestra
will change. And when it does, I will recover my interest in
hearing what
it has to say, hoping to detect that great old sound fired by new
ideas.

Copyright 2007 Newsday Inc.

Dan Leeson
DNLeeson@-----.net

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.5.446 / Virus Database: 268.18.5/707 - Release Date:
3/1/2007 2:43 PM

-------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> It's the Woodwind.Org 2007 donation drive!
>>> Visit https://secure.donax-us.com/donations/ for more information