My goodness, it’s certainly been a big month for female musicians in the public eye! I’m admittedly a bit behind the times (haste makes waste) with all theze crazy newzez, but criminy, what a load of subliminal stuff to digest. Two, not just one, but two female singers have been making headlines lately. One of them for dying and one of them for being good even though she’s a woman and not anorexic (don’t crucify me for these fightin’ words). 

Let’s start with Whitney, God bless her:

“Women in pop culture are particularly framed with this “poor little prima donna who destroyed her talent” garbage. When great male musicians die, it’s unusual to have their substance issues splayed forth in the obit headline… why was Billie Holliday’s love affair with heroin so tragic, but Miles Davis and John Coltrane … not so much? Why is Sinead O'Conner a nutcase but Van Halen is just a darling bunch of naughty rockers? Why is Madonna’s mental state on the front page every day, but not Justin Beiber’s?” (http://susiebright.blogs.com/susie_brights_journal_/2012/02/whitney-houstons-death-is-probably-not-what-you-think-it-is-.html)

I could perhaps dismiss these outspoken comments by holding up someone like Michael Jackson as a counter-example, I know, but she’s onto something. Susie has some interesting things to say, but perhaps short little newsblurbs sum it up the best:

“Whitney Houston, who reigned as pop music‘s queen until her majestic voice and regal image were ravaged by drug use, erratic behavior and a tumultuous marriage […] has died.”
http://thefeministwire.com/2012/02/whitney-houston-is-dead-at-48/

Read: Erratic behavior? Don’t act crazy, it will kill you, woman! Or if you do act erratic, be regal and majestic too, somehow! And this from a feminist website!

But take heart, my fellow songbirds. There is a woman out there you can look up to, one who’s not so crazy or old:

“…I was heartened by the appearance of Adele, the young blue-eyed soul singer from East London who won Best New Artist at the Grammys earlier this year. I love her. She seems young and brash and fun and mouthy and unapologetic about her body (I love that the article mentions that she went to an In-and-Out Burger after the Grammys and wanted to get two milkshakes, one for each award she received)…Also, she should be in Vogue. The girl is gorgeous. Not gorgeous for a big girl. Gorgeous. Period. She’s got some face and she’s got some figure.”
http://feministmusicgeek.com/tag/adele/

See, she can do anything men can do! She can have her milkshakes and drink them too! (Note the use of the word “young” twice in nearly adjacent paragraphs as a means of laudation).

The feminist(?)musicgeek encourages her readers to support and applaud female artists in the mainstream: “My mom might have acquired a taste for Joanna Newsom when I played ’Sawdust and Diamonds’ for her, but what’s not to love about these ladies?” then goes on to write an epic FOUR paragraphs about Adele’s weight. Yes, it is true that she is a beautiful woman, but what male artists are being sticked-up-for-via-discussion in regards to their appearance?

These (appearance and weight) are topics which dwell outside of the auditory experience and which of a modern feminist should steer clear. We can knowingly and sarcastically blog about the “sad white boy” phenomena (don’t get upset, I’m only quoting former said blog (see link)) as long as we, at the same time, say “it’s good to support this mainstream artist because she’s a woman (we are so heartened to see you getting famous!) and we need to support her” and “hey let’s remind everyone that women are still beautiful even if they are at a healthy weight’ or in other cases "look at this looney bird in a swan dress”. Until we (women, ourselves!) stop even continuing this discussion, how can ladies in music even hope to move forward?
I guarantee you that not nearly as many “male” or “mostly-male” bands/artists have had article after article written about these silly things. Why don’t we write, instead, about the music itself? In this way perhaps we can come closer to a more complete auditory/intellectual/emotional evaluation of ALL music.

Shortly after Adele was so graced at the Grammys, I heard a somehow exasperating piece on NPR about why her music was so “emotionally intensive”: the “power of appoggiatura” (dictionary.com translation of that funny italian word: a grace note performed before a note of the melody and falling on the beat). Apparently during the chorus of one of her most beloved songs, Adele deftly dips her voice down a half step for about a millisecond (not, in this case, before the melodic note but in the middle of it, ahem). It is in this interval, according to science, that her superhuman strength lies.  I must confess the explicatory audio clip didn’t really do it for me. And here is my problem. Yes, Adele has an effing fantastic voice. It’s lovely. She deserves to be recognized. But there she is on top of the world - without doing the writing all on her own.

It’s very, very common for female singers to have “help” in writing their chart-topping hits, if they even have anything to do with the compositional process. Especially the top sellers. But which male artists who win awards and are lauded for their sad-music “breakthroughs” (think Bon Iver or Radiohead) get there without writing their own darn music? As a highly trained classical pianist (I work at a university and have a degree from a top conservatory) I know that most anyone with physical/mental predisposition and loads and loads of hours of effort can cultivate their performance ability on instrument or voice. But what about self expression and creativity? Oh no, ladies. These are the ways of men. Why don’t you let them write heartbreaking songs that you can then lend your sexy voice to afterwards?

“Most female songwriters I know tend to be ‘top-liners’, writing the melody and lyrics to a song, while men still dominate the track and production (as is the case with Lily Allen and her collaborator Greg Kurstin).”

“Even though around 20% of the UK’s contemporary classical composers are female, this is not reflected at the Proms or at any other major concert series or festival. Of all the works performed by the LSO between 1997 and 2002, 1.3% were written by women. Of those that were written in the last 50 years, 6.5% were by women.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2010/may/24/women-behind-music

I am not saying that women who are gifted with voices like Adele’s or Whitney’s should step down from the spotlight or stop treating the world to their crooning skills. That would be akin to saying composers should stop writing operas or symphonies because they can’t perform the material themselves. Not very feasible or practical or desirable. But maybe we should start differentiating between Performers and Creators, not between men and women. Instead of focusing on the fact that musicians are of a certain sex (and all the extra-curricular discussion this entails), why don’t we focus on the creative efforts that go into their work? Maybe we’ll encourage more women to follow a musical career path. Maybe the LSO would program some more estrogen-y stuff, if it was being judged solely by virtue of its musical quality.

For now, I won’t even go into the implied issues (regarding expression and self-censorship and social roles and psychology) that the low number of women in creative music represents. That’s kind of what this whole blogging thing is all about.