More mention of Connie Weldon

[Todd S. Malicoate]

James, I hope that if you learn anything else from reading and posting here it is this:

Your personal experiences do not necessarily reflect a trend or the norm. When you go off to graduate school, I hope you can learn to temper your excessive use of words like "a lot of" and "many" when you really have no idea if the words apply to anything but your own anecdotal experiences. I think you will find that heeding that advice will serve you well in your graduate-level studies (good luck with those, by the way).

I do find it distressing to hear your story of what is being presented as "music education" at an unnamed university. The notion that girls should be "steered" toward double reed instruments because they are more responsible is (admittedly, to me) ridiculous and somewhat offensive. Why would this even be a topic of study in a music education class? Such "teaching" is right along the same lines as "put the fat kid in the back on the tuba." I think knuxie's fine post just a few entries ago does a nice job of presenting how students should be allowed to pick their own instruments, and that seems to be a much more effective method to me.

I don't know where you got the notion that "a lot" of band directors seek out large, "chubby," un-athletic males to be tuba players...perhaps "a lot" of the directors you know and have asked about it do, but that doesn't mean "a lot" of them do in general. Man, I'm so tired of this "fat kids play tuba" crap. You may be absolutely correct, but I hope not. I am absolutely sure that you don't have any real evidence to back up your assertion. I can only hope that when my 8-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter are ready to start band classes their teachers aren't as short-sighted and bigoted in their views of what kids "can" and "can't" play.

Perhaps there are some other beginning band teachers on the forum that can shed more light on this disturbing assertion...do you "steer" students toward a particular instrument based on how they look or their gender, or do you allow them the freedom to choose and let the chips fall where they may?

[Kayla]

Duh, girls that play tuba just do it to get all the guys!

How do you think I got my fiance?

Just thought I would lighten the mood up a bit, hehe.

[Kevin Hendrick]

Duh, girls that play tuba just do it to get all the guys!

How do you think I got my fiance?

Just thought I would lighten the mood up a bit, hehe.

There ya go!

[TubaRay]

I don't collect data, and I'm certainly no psychologist, but MUST we be officially-labeled "experts" to realize that men and women are **DIFFERENT , and that MOST boys will gravitate towards certain types of things and MOST girls will gravitate towards certain other types of things? Have you NEVER (being a man) overheard women's conversations or (being a woman) overheard men's conversations and noticed how unappealing those conversations are to you?

To me, you have hit the point quite solidly, here. If I remember correctly, in the seventies, the "wisdom" was that men & women(and, I suppose, boys & girls) are equal. This seemed to also be interpreted as being the same. Without going into the significantly large differences that exist amongst all of us, let us say that men and women are equal, but we are not the same. Each gender has a propensity toward certain things. It is not 100% the same, but generalizations can be made, just as bloke has done(see above quote).

From my standpoint, I am sooooo glad for the differences between men and women. By the way, the photos you included served to remind me how glad I am for at least some of those differences.

Ken's post makes an excellent statement, also.

[TubaRay]

As you further your academic career, the realization that you're not always correct, and that people will not always agree with your views simply because you believe you are right, are handy thoughts to ponder.

These are handy thoughts for any of us to ponder, and the sooner we realize the truth and wisdom of this statement, the more likely we are to negotiate our way around this old world with some happiness.

[AsiagoCheezBagel]

Someone wrote that we play tuba to get guys? That's so funny... Mmm, I know when I walk into the tuba room at school that I am in the presence of the finest bachelors on campus! Gosh, it's like being a kid in a candy store. Hahaha, I got a kick out of that!

Are we still debating the other stuff? We are in the 21st century now, correct?

Come on folks, all of us tuba players care about is making music, working hard and having fun. Oh, and eating. Eating is great too.

One thing to add, and everyone's free to their own opinion on this, but I think that we are all free to interpret how our gender affects our personalities, because we are all different in that regard. I even think we can integrate these things into our playing if we want to. I actually find English horn solos in many pieces to sound very "motherly" to me. Why not, right?

In short, what I am trying to say is, yes, we are all equal, but there is no reason that we need to completely ignore our gender. I'm not saying that anyone on here proposed that we should being ignoring it, I'm just putting it out there as something to think about.

[Mojo workin']

Come on folks, all of us tuba players care about is making music, working hard and having fun. Oh, and eating. Eating is great too.

And beer. Don't forget beer.

[Kevin Hendrick]

Come on folks, all of us tuba players care about is making music, working hard and having fun. Oh, and eating. Eating is great too.

And beer. Don't forget beer.

Yup -- beer is good.

[AsiagoCheezBagel]

That is so true... ITEA actually stands for International Tubists for Eating and Alcohol.

[Matt G]

One of the things it said was try to put girls on double reed instruments, as when they are younger they are more responsible (another characteristic). I will say in the band world, flute is a female dominant instrument, and clarinet as well. In my experiences, 75% of clarinet players are female, while about 97% of flute players are female. The few flute players who were male I knew dropped out of band because they got tired of playing a girly instrument. There are several recorded male flute players, as with clarinets. But if you look at the big scheme of things, flute is a much older instrument, and I will say in about 20 years tuba will contain probably more to a 75% to 25% ratio of male vs. female, which is not bad considering what I am about to mention.

Don't fabricate statistics. These are, without a doubt, fabricated.

While you spend some time in grad school, I suggest you try to squeeze stats 101 & 102 under your belt. I really don't think you have the cognitive tools of analysis that you think you do. You aren't alone in this regard. There are a lot of students in non-technical graduate degrees who rely on mathematical analysis without knowing how/when/where to use these tools. Being able to see how statistics are generated, the difference between a statistic and parameter, the difference between causation and correlation, etc. will be very useful to you in your academic journey.

[TUBAD83]

One thing I have noticed about this forum is that people are very VERY quick to correct others to the point of being disrespectful, rude, condescending "Alpha Hotels". I have met degreed, intelligent, well-paid professionals who were complete JERKS--I have also met people who never finished high school, but were able to have an intelligent conversation on just about any subject and had great personalities and excellent manners. My point--We need to show a bit more respect and maturity to each other. Manners count--even in cyberspace.

Go back in time to when you first started playing tuba and think about this: how many people did you know who would wanted to have a 20+ pound bulky hunk of metal in their laps (or on their backs) and blow huge amounts of air through it every day?? How many people did you know who would have been physically capable of doing it? None of the girls I knew back then (or NOW for that matter) would ever dream of playing tuba...but guess what--the vast majority of guys I knew would not either. We all know you have to have a certain mindset and a certain...uniqueness about you to want to play tuba and play it well. I think its great that more young girls are taking up tuba and they seem to enjoy it just fine (I believe there were a couple of female all-state tuba players here in TX last year) So its really not about being male/female, big/small, black/white--its about personal choice.

JJ

[bearphonium]

No stats, just some observations...

There are a number of reasons why "society" is what it is, and there are as many "reasons" for that as there are people in that society. That said:

In my personal experience, I have been the only female low brass player in my high school band, the worst trombone player in my college band (hastening my switch to french horn) and a member of a New Horizons band where there are 5 female low brass players (and at 51, I am the youngest.) I have been a deputy sheriff for 24 years, and a street cop for 22 years. In that time, my department has gone from a high of 5 female patrol cops with one femal sergeant, to just me and the same female sergeant. During that time, I tested for and was not selected for promotion to sergeant, although I had the highest combined score (from a written test and an oral board review); I have been told that my gender was only a secondary aspect of that non-promotion (although, cowboy jokes to the contrary, I have never seen a male lesbian, which was the reason that I was given by the retired captain.)Coincidently, I had lunch with a deputy who is working our transport section, who was told that her 'lifestyle choice' of being a mother would 'hamper' her police career. She played the trumpet, by the way. She is married to another one of our deputies (male, he played drums) who has not been told that their choice to have kids reflects in any negative way on his career.

So, this is a statistically small, non-controlled, unscientific sample. In a predominantly male environment (law enforcement) one woman is not selected for promotion for her sexual orientation and another is limited in her assignment because she is a young woman who wants to have children. Bias?

And, completely unrelated, when we go in service, we have to provide our initials. We do not use IRC, so those "alpha hotels" in your parlance, are "adam henrys" in ours.

Ally"540 in service, Adam Adam Henry, 540"House

[Rick Denney]

If women DO have the same opportunity as men to become tuba players (for example), why are there so few of them? Are they inherently worse low brass players? NO. Are they inherently uninterested in music? NO. Are there additional external forces encouraging them not to get involved? I say yes. I don't say "special help." I say "fix the inequity."

Have you done the research necessary to support your assertions?

Correlation does not prove causation.

Consider this: Supposing women are smarter than men (as insisted by a large class of women's activists, and not disputed by me). If they are, then maybe they are smart enough to realize that studying the tuba for years and years in college in order to possibly have a likelihood of showing up with 150 other qualified applicants for an audition, which will, by the way, take place behind a screen (!), isn't the surest path to financial security in this life.

You cannot assert that women are discriminated against in hiring on the basis of comparing percentages to the general population until you have shown that the women who desire to be professionals are represented at those percentages. Supposing not so many 6th-grade girls want to play the tuba?

Maybe they want the inequity. I don't see many complaining that women are under-represented among, say, sanitary workers.

My observation of the engineering profession: Women who enter engineering because they want to be engineers have every bit the same chance of success as men, and sometimes more. In fact, they are snapped up quickly and often paid a premium because companies are trying to make percentages look good in a profession that few women choose to pursue, for whatever reason. There are also women and men who enter engineering because they think it will pay well but who are not particularly interesting in being engineers. After all, if we insist that music, or teaching, requires a calling, I think it's only fair to insist that engineering does, too. Among those people, women are much more likely to be promoted to next-level management positions than are men, based on my observation, as a means of getting them out of harm's way while still keeping the percentages high on the employment roles so that people like you won't complain of inequitable outcomes. I have not noticed that women are any more likely to be in one category or another in comparison with men.

Question for you: Should people be evaluated on their own merits or on the past sins committed against whatever group to which they happen to belong?

Rick "who has nothing against sanitary workers" Denney

[ginnboonmiller]

The funny thing is... All I have wanted to say in this thread is that there is no reason NOT to mention that Connie Weldon is one of the rare role models for women and girls in low brass.

[imperialbari]

Haven’t followed all of this thread, but got that much that we shouldn’t evaluate each others on the basis of gender or whatever non-musical personal feature.

In another thread a crappy (selfalleged so) young lady invited some roughness coming down on her all female ensemble. But what was displayed within the forum was kind of moderate compared to exchanges behind the screen.

Yet nobody should pitty the young ladies, as they dont refrain from making fun of the most bursting needs of elderly male low brass players on their private sites:



Yes, I a bit too often would want an auxilliary bladder, but wouldn’t dare mounting it that obviously, if I ever dared acquire one.

Klaus

[Plugo]

Connie was one of the best tuba teachers in the country. her tuba studio at one time had about 25 tuba majors. many students of her students made in the business as a player or teacher or both. For Example Sam Pilafian, James jenkins, scott tarabour, mike roylance and the list goes on and on. the tuba ensemble was an important part not only to recruit new students but for teaching as well. i am upset that they have not re master the recording the tuba ensemble made in the early 70's. the tuba chamber concept was a pionner ensemble in the US and i am glad the U of Miami was part of it.

i did not take a lesson from her when i was a junior high school student in the early 80's. but i was aware of reputation as a teaher. for me it was the biggest mistake of my life not reaching out to her at an early age. it did not have the money for lessons.

i had the chance to meet here in the early 1990's when she was the dean of the University of Miami. she was well respected by her colleagues. it is too bad that she retired to soon.

[imperialbari]

In the brass band I play in, out of 12 low brass players, we have three women (two trombone, one baritone, exceptional musicians all) and one nelly homosexual tuba player. Four "low-brass minorities" out of twelve (4/12 = 1/4), pretty good. No one cares be you girl, black, brown, pasty white, 'mo, whatever so long as you show up and can play the book. And I honestly believe that in the music industry, like greater society, for the vast majority of people, none of those labels or external characteristics matter.

You may have whatever opinions or orientation of your liking, but I take big issue with your math skills. I profoundly fear how you handle Pythagorean proportions.

4/12=1/3

At least in math, but in music 1/3 may end up as a fifth, without a commission ending up with the mob.


Klaus

[imperialbari]

Nice pic of Miss Jester, Klaus. Another role model, no doubt.

Ken F.

Hopefully not for me in the auxiliary bladder matter!

But after all she has managed to overcome the very common mono-colour-problem of conical low brasses. I have seen her portrayed with the same euph as a redtop as well as a brunette. So her investment in a good instrument has not been in vain.

Klaus (who has eye problems, but is not blind in the really important matters)

[J.c. Sherman]

Without plunging into this debate (yet), I throw some salt in the wound.

I play tuba because of sexism. Yes, I'm male.

I started out on flute. It was my first love, my first instrument, my first choice. But for a boy to play flute was woefully unpopular in late elementary and junior high. It got me harassed, kicked, beaten, threatened, bullied, and in cooperation with my general lack of popularity, held at knife point while having my flute thrown around as it made these asses laugh.

I didn't enjoy that.

In 8th grade, I went into school mid-year and BEGGED my band director (a woman) for something socially acceptable. I was handed a "baritone" (euphonium).

And the clobbering slowed. At least I wasn't harassed for that anymore. But my reputation was already set.

Thankfully, I moved frequently as a Navy brat, and moved away from most of this, but I was cocky enough to offer my next band director the option of me playing anything he wanted. He chose tuba, and the rest is history.

This was in the 80s. Not the 19th century.

I dare you to tell me there isn't sexism in instrument choice and social acceptance. Why aren't there more female tubists? Why aren't there more Male flautists? Not only because we insist on begging the question, but we are socialized from infancy by our families and society at large as to what is acceptable or expected from us. I made an unpopular decision in that social construct and paid for it bitterly, and in such a manner that I will always harbor immense resentment and hatred for the narrow mindedness of my peers.

I do still play flute. I took lessons secretly (seriously) for 6 years, and I still play for my own enjoyment and still own three flutes. And I'm please that my sons prefer my flute playing to anything else I pull out. But I'm not a pro. That door closed a long time ago.

J.c.S.

P.S. I guess I just plunged in...

[Tundratubast]

During 1970-71 my HS band director Jerry Siverson, took a two year sabatical and went to the U of Miami for his MMA in Piano/Performance. He returned to our school upon completion of the program, but to our surprise in the low brass section, we ended up having a special week-long tuba-euphonium sectional with Connie Weldon at Hawley HS during the summer of 1971. Somehow, our director, convinced Connie, to come north to the MN lake country during July and escape Miamis' heat. It was an incredible week, definitely sent me down the path of enjoying the tuba. Her visit also convinced our school board to move from sousaphones to 4 MW20-4v and dump the marching program. My class had 52 students, 26 in band, the band was 105 pieces strong. I was also the captain and mvp of the football team and we went 0-9 that year. At that time the schools priorities were right, the concert bands smoked for about two decades. Ms. Weldon is indeed an incredible role model and has influenced many a younger persons future. Thank you Connie for influencing mine.