Gender equality remains elusive in Choral Settings
Tuesday, 5 July 2011, 11:05am
Press Release: Department of Gender Grievance Identification
Gender equality remains elusive in Choral Settings
Choirs remain places where little progress has been made in acheiving gender equality says Director of Gender Grievance Identification, Dr Elsbeth Wingealot.
We were shocked and dismayed to find that women remain excluded from singing the traditional male parts given to tenors and basses in choral settings. In an era when many women have acheived success in traditionally male dominated arenas women still remain restricted to singing parts written for sopranos and altos in all our major choirs.
To redress the unfairness this poses towards women we are today releasing draft legislation to address this and are asking for legislators to support the passage of this legislation through Parliament
The intent of this bill will be to legislate that whenever a piece of music as written contains a part that requires a singer to sing a note below A3 (the A below middle C or 220hz) that the choir director transpose that part into a higher register in such a manner that the lowest note that a singer will be required to to sing does not fall below A3. This will enable the parts written for Tenor and Bass voices to be sung by women by moving them to a vocal range more suitable to womens voices.
We look forward to the day when choral gender equality has been acheived and women are no longer excluded from becoming tenors and basses in any of our major choirs
ENDS
Try and imagine Helen Clark singing 'Bess, You Is My Woman Now.'
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, better you don't try.