The Berklee College of Music in Boston is one of the better schools of music in America, somewhat like Juilliard but not as good and, importantly, Berklee, unlike Juilliard concentrates on modern music. Wikipedia says this about it:
Berklee College of Music (/ˈbɜːrkli/) is a private music college in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known for the study of jazz and modern American music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including rock, hip hop, reggae, salsa, heavy metal and bluegrass.
I knew about it when I lived in Boston and Cambridge, but at that time Berklee didn’t have this (click to read):
What does jazz have to do with gender justice. Well, these days one might well ask the question, “What doesn’t have to do with gender justice?” When you see the name, you can almost write the specifics, a few of which are indented below:
What would jazz sound like in a culture without patriarchy?
The jazz industry remains predominantly male due to a biased system, imposing a significant toll on those who aspire to work in it. In understanding the importance of balance and equity, the goal of the Berklee Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice is to do corrective work and modify the way jazz is perceived and presented, so the future of jazz looks different than its past without rendering invisible many of the art form’s creative contributors.
The Berklee Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice will focus on equity in the jazz field and the role that jazz plays in the larger struggle for gender justice. The institute will celebrate the contributions women have made in the development of the art form as well as frame more equitable conditions for all pursuing careers in jazz in an effort to work toward a necessary and lasting cultural shift in the field.
Inclusive to All
We welcome students of all gender and sexual identities to achieve the goal of true gender diversity in the field. The institute will work to address gender inequities at the college through curriculum, recruitment, residencies, performances, research, and community engagement.
Our Mission
The mission of the Berklee Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice is to support and sustain a cultural transformation in jazz, with the commitment to recruit, teach, mentor, and advocate for musicians seeking to study or perform jazz, with gender justice and racial justice as guiding principles.
Our Values
- Imagination
- Equity
- Freedom
- Identity
Our Vision
We cultivate creative practice and scholarship within an integrated and egalitarian setting. We seek to engage ourselves and others in the pursuit of jazz without patriarchy, and in making a long-lasting cultural shift in the overall music community, recognizing the role that jazz can play in the larger struggle for social justice.
Note that they are striving for equity, which means that they want their students and professors, and jazz in general, to be absolutely representative of the sex admixture in America itself. That is, 50% of jazz performers and composers are to be female. The implicit assumption is that this lack of equity reflects sexism and the patriarchy which of course needs to be shown.
Further, the explicit assumption is that the two sexes (or people who don’t identify as “cis”) will produce different types of jazz, a type that is not “male biased”—a jazz not infused with the sound of patriarchy. That, too, is a problematic assumption.
I don’t think I need to muse about the wokeness represented by this institute, which attempts to achieve jazz equity by admitting and educating students after they’ve already finished high school. That, too, is problematic, for if there are biases or inequalities of opportunity that impinge on the sexes earlier in life, then perhaps they can’t be rectified in college.
At any rate, here are the questions that Berklee should have asked itself before founding this institute:
- By striving for equity, you are assuming that members of both sexes (or those who don’t identify as members of their biological sex) have an equal desire to create, sing, or play jazz, and the absence of this equity reflects biases (this is implicit in the word “patriarchy”. What evidence do you have for this equality of desires?
- Are there possibly other reasons for an absence of women in jazz beyond “patriarchy”? Could women not have less of a preference to play or compose jazz than do men? Or are they less competitive musically—less willing to put in the many hours needed to excel when there are other things to be interested in, or less competitive because, as some have suggested, excelling in music is a way to attract mates. (This “sexual selection” hypothesis might be least partly possible: I remember Charlie Parker saying that although he wasn’t any great shake in looks, his ability with the sax got him a lot of sex.) In other words, what evidence do you have that inequities are not due to factors other than biases?
- You state explicitly that the forms of jazz produced by musicians with “equity” would be different from what it is like today? This assumes that the sexes have, on average, palpably different ways of producing or playing jazz. What evidence do you have for this?
- Why do you think it is possible to rectify any biases against women in jazz by taking action on the college level? Would it not be better to afford everyone equal opportunities to become jazz composers or musicians when they are younger? And what if affording such equal opportunity still produced inequities, as it would if the sexes differed in abilities, interests, or preferences? Would you still try to achieve equality of representation?
Now I’ve listened to a lot of jazz, and yes, there is a paucity of women composers and players, though there are plenty of women who sing jazz. But before I’d try to construct a program that is designed to turn out equal numbers of male and female players and composers, I’d sure like to know the answers to the questions above. But I doubt Berklee even asked themselves these questions, and, if they didn’t, then what they have is a performative institute—in both senses of the word.
Fun fact :
“Berklee” is an arrangement (wink wink) of the name Lee Eliot Berk.
Now you know…. actually I just looked this up too :
“(founded as Schillinger House in 1945 by his father, Lawrence Berk, who renamed the school after Lee in 1954) ”
… but yeah, I’m glad Berklee’s praxis on behalf of all “genders” … I assume all the “genders” met and signed a Big Document putting the Big Theory into praxis, I just must have been out of town that day.
Interesting that their bromide text has eight mentions of gender but only one of race. Presumably the genres of music studied at Berklee mean this is one place where black faculty and students are not underrepresented. The fact that they are very probably massively over-represented (in relation to “equity”, if equity means representation in proportion to the population) is of course an issue that no one is ever going to raise.
“Juilliard” is misspelled.
It is a typo. Best to email me rather than comment, as I might not see it. Fixed, thanks.
Given jazz’s origin, any use by white folk is “cultural appropriation”, no?
/s
One could also look at it the other way around. Jazz has its roots in African-American communities that integrated European musical elements (melody, harmony, musical instruments) into their music, which often originated in West Africa. African Americans have thus appropriated “white culture” about 100 years ago.
Irony off 😉
This is not actually true! According to numbers given in Berklee’s Common Data Set (https://www.berklee.edu/institutional-assessment/common-data-set), among non-international students at Berklee only 9% are black (54% are white, 19% are Latino/a, and 8% are Asian); this is less than the proportion of black people in the overall U.S. population (14%).
As an aside, I don’t really have too much of a problem with studying the intersection of feminism and jazz, even if the way this is presented can come off as a bit over the top. I wouldn’t expect women to play jazz differently from men, but why not check if that’s true?
My point was one you made in your last para: yes, by all means see if men and women play jazz differently before you make that assertion. If not, that may affect your decision about creating equity as a way to create diverse forms of music.
I’m a woman who has studied both music and a stereotypically male-dominated STEM field, and there was actually more overt sexism in music than in the STEM field. By overt sexism I mean explicit “women can’t/shouldn’t do X” type statements by other students (though not professors). I’ve never encountered such language studying or working in STEM fields. I don’t know if this is made better or worse by how difficult it is to get employed as a musician or composer.
There are nowadays a fair amount of female composers in contemporary art music (Sofia Gubaidulina died just this year!) but there seem to not be as many in jazz. I didn’t study jazz and ended up giving up studies in music because I didn’t see music being a good long term career, so I can’t go in any more detail on the academic side of things.
I don’t know if at the college level there is much you can do to encourage people to, say, switch majors to composition or to focus on jazz over classical. I would agree that you really would need to start much earlier to attract potential female musicians and convince them it’s worth staying in such a precarious field. As much as I loved and still love music composition, it’s highly competitive, poorly paid, and unstable.
I’ve never seen any convincing evidence that men and women compose differently. It is funny because historically, the idea that men and women have different “composition styles” has been used to patronizingly dismiss the music of female composers.
My favorite jazz pianist, Hiromi, graduated from Berklee. She composes her own music as well as performs standards. I enjoyed her concerts tremendously, as well as those of European women jazz composers and performers. The latter are not as well known as Hiromi.
Mary Lou Williams was a legendary jazz composer, arranger, and pianist. She was the only woman to perform along with the male jazz giants of her time.
So women jazz composers were/are working, but FSR they are not as well known as their male counterparts. It’s not for lack of talent.
Actually, there was Melba Liston (trombone). Just watched a video of “Dizzy’s Dream Band” with a group of the jazz greats including her at Lincoln Center performing with a Dizxy Gillespie big band-a truly wonderful one to watch.
“I mean explicit ‘women can’t/shouldn’t do X’ type statements by other [music] students”
Holy cow, that is ridiculous! I continue to be surprised by the sexism of this ilk that exists (I heard many bad stories from women — even at my last employer, which was a really great and welcoming place and had a higher percentage of women engineers than any other firm I ever worked for).
I wondered if men liked jazz more than women. That is not the case, in fact in the US there are more women who like jazz than men (30 million to 29 million, although in percentages that is 28% of men and 27% of women). Life audiences appear to be 52% women and 48% men.
See:
https://bentleysdavis.medium.com/sexism-jazz-the-gendered-brain-and-a-love-of-music-23eed7f06f2
Anecdote alert: I volunteered for a jazz organization for several years. I have no musical ability whatsoever, so I admire and appreciate those who do.
Over the years, I noticed that our concert audiences were approximately 70% male. However, when the artist was a woman, the audience changed to about 50% female.
Our organization booked women artists especially during Women’s History Month, but sporadically at other times. The organization’s stated goal was to sell tickets, and women artists are not as well known as men so they sell fewer tickets. Of course, if women artists had more opportunities to perform, they’d become better known and sell more tickets…
Ethnically, all audiences were heterogeneous regardless of the artist’s sex or ethnicity.
Women are a slight majority on the population. And this “gap” grows for older cohorts (men die earlier).
Might those numbers simply reflect demographics? But your point is clear: There’s no disparity in “love of jazz” between men and women.
For a group that prides itself on improv, they sure seem determined to stick with the ideological script.
I was going to say something similar. Their mission statement (if that is what it is) says little about jazz or music or art.
Now I can extend some benefit of the doubt. Years ago at a different university I was stuck on an ad hoc faculty committee that was tasked with making a mission statement for our department. Some members had a lot of energy, and they spun up this long, hyperbolic statement full of thick, gooey pablum that had nothing to do with who we were (which was a small commuter college). After many hours and many meetings, a single person got fed up and forced thru a much more sensible statement and the rest of us seized on that and we were done.
But imagine if this music school did not have someone like that singe person.
Or that person got shouted down. Bigot!
The music school is in Massachusetts. Gender (not music) is what folks up there really care about. The fact that the dominant issue of our time (as seen by them) has infiltrated music should surprise no one.
For instance, here are the International Sweethearts of Rhythm (1937–1949), an all-female jazz band. Who can tell by just listening to the music whether the players are women or men? I can’t.
C’mon! Put on your intersectional hat! They feel coerced to copy the patriarchal style! Of course! /sarcasm
It’s great to be welcoming to all, and even to seek Jazz composers and players from beyond the traditional sources. But I’m not convinced that the dearth of female Jazz composers and players is a matter of social justice. That seems to be a stretch, but the social justice schtick is fashionable so it may attract a few potential students.
I like the last sentence especially, “performative institute” …
There are significant gender differences in the choice of instrument to play even within a single genre of music. In a typical classical orchestra you will observe many women flautists, violinists, and violaists (is that a word?). But more men and fewer women play trumpet, bassoon, bass viol, and tuba. If find it hard to believe that deliberate exclusionary discrimination is the explanation for that. If men and women tend to be interested in playing different instruments, I don’t see a problem.
+1
Garrisson Keilor once said that saxophone is an instrument that mothers don’t want their daughters to play.
Berklee recently cancelled a presentation from a student who is also detransitioner. You can watch his talk and Q&A on YouTube. So much for respecting “gender diversity.”
I think there are more men in music, generally, because of your point 2. Or at least a subset of your point 2.
As Paul McCartney is alleged to have replied when asked why he took up rock and roll, “to get girls!”
To put it more crassly: Women don’t need to play music, excel in sports, be wealthy, or be “important” in some aspect of life to get laid. It’s much more significant for men. This is really crass; but fits my observations in life.
Two words: Larry Summers.
I’m waiting for the de-gendering of barbecue. Can you all just IMAGINE the complex and nuanced differences between cis male ribs and that of a rack of ribs that isn’t burdened by the historical hierarchy of the patriarchy?
I sent this post out to friends, [especially those involved in DEI workshops but not on college campus so they tell me their workshops are very different!], with these comments:
In case you’re wondering how come center LEFT people disagree with and critique “equity” and so DEI here is great reasoned example.
My 2 notes, 1. “equity” has two meanings, the author professor of evolutionary biology, AGREES with and SUPPORTS the first meaning: providing more [i.e. unequal as in the famous boxes/baseball illustration] resources so more equal opportunity, he DISAGREES with second social justice left meaning: equal outcomes to US demographics, if not, the only possible cause is bigotry, racism, sexism, etc.
in terms language, leaving aside “equity” for a moment, i would not call this and i would not be focused on “GENDER equity” but “SEX equity”: besides the fact Berklee is mainly but not only talking about patriarchy and women.
do they really support–we don’t even haave good numbers for USA demographics–have exact USA demographics of “ALL[???????] gender[s] and sexual identities*”?????? in their program? Not even Hollywood has gone that far in its requirements to be considered for Oscar nomination!
*”all”” is quite inclusive and am guessing there are at least two or more “sexual identities” they –and probably you–would NOT support but I could be wrong!
I can’t speak for the host PCC(E) but you I think are wrong about equity as depicted by the boxes at the ball-park fence. The cartoon giving two crates, presumably stolen from someone who built them with his wood and labour or paid money for them, to the short guy so he can watch the game for free illustrates not equality of opportunity at all, but purely equality of outcome. The latter is equity. If all three of the freeloaders, depicted invidiously with brown skin!, had had the same opportunity to compete on merit for jobs that would pay some or all of them enough (or maybe not enough — who cares?) to buy game tickets (or wooden crates), that would be equality of opportunity. We can’t discern equality of opportunity just from inspecting outcomes, which is why cartoons about equity don’t bother trying to depict it.
Focus on outcomes sparks envy, which allows the demagogue to set various “equity-seeking” groups against each other, making the demagogue a power-broker who wins no matter who loses.