So few women

[Cindy]

Too often I am the only representative of my gender at the jam (OT, BG). I have asked the women who sometimes come why they don't come more often. Their reasons involve other obligations: relatives in town, errands to run, work to finish, soccer practice.The men have families and jobs but prioritize music, to getting to the darn jam!
Are the women who don't show up covering for men who are prioritizing something else they love, like woodworking, ducking hunting, golf?
All-female bands are rare. All-male bands are the norm.
Women who love making music have to be talented, hardworking, and able to swim like mad upstream against all the norms and expectations that hold them back. Not to quote HRC, but I do not want to stay home and bake cookies.
At a bluegrass festival, in crazy liberal New England, the leader of a band on stage asked all the men to stand up, tell their wives and gfs how much they loved them, and thank them for not getting angry when they stayed up late jamming. Yeah, he basically told me I was a freak of nature for daring to be a woman who wanted to stay up late jamming.
Plenty of great women in bluegrass (and rock, blues, etc.) front otherwise all-male bands. Could they not find women play with? Probably not. See above.
So this is a rant for all genders. Men, pay attention. Women, get out here and play with me!

[Dave Perry]

It's still the societal norm that the men get to play and the women tend to the home and the kids. Not being political or anything else, and not saying that the men don't work too, but if we're being honest, that's still how it is in most cases. Certainly not all!

And I'm with you--let's get the ladies out there playing!

Signed,

A Man.

[Jeff Mando]

Good rant! And true, it seems. George Gruhn once wrote he knew a way to DOUBLE the vintage guitar business -- get women interested! Easier said than done......

[Petrus]

Are the women who don't show up covering for men who are prioritizing something else they love, like woodworking, ducking hunting, golf? All-female bands are rare. All-male bands are the norm.

They are the norm and always have been for one reason for the other. Most likely the family issue, but that's less true these days so it might just be women don't feel that comfortable being the stand out (unless they like being the stand out, when they're fronting a band.) But I don't hear a lot of men wondering why more women don't like woodworking, golf, or duck hunting. Diff'rent strokes and all that.

[foldedpath]

While I'd like to see more women in all genres of music, there are a few genres like OldTime and Irish/Scottish trad where you might have a better chance of meeting female musicians.

I was at a small Scottish/Irish pub session last weekend with an equal male/female ratio. Four females on fiddle, and four males on fiddle, pipes, guitar, and mandolin (me). One of the four lady fiddlers is the session leader. I've seen the ratio go higher with this same session, as high as 2:1 ratio of women to men. I've been at fiddle workshops (as a mandolinist) where I was the only guy in the room, with the instructor and participants all women.

It's not all fiddlers but they dominate the female ratio. I do know of two women in this area who play Irish/Scottish backing guitar (one of whom is also a fiddler), and I know one lady piper and flute player.

I think the fiddle emphasis is because it was more common for girls to have taken violin lessons as kids (compared to say, guitar) for the usual cultural reasons. Then they either continued playing the rest of their lives, or dropped it and picked it up again later in life. That's a common trajectory, and the one followed by my Significant Other, who now plays fiddle again with me at home, and in local sessions.

So if you want to meet more women playing amateur music for fun, check out a local Irish session and you might see a few. Just make sure you like fiddle music.

[catmandu2]

Additionally - to f-path's:

Dont know where I heard it - concertina is/was/somewhere/'historically' regarded as a lass's instrument; it certainly is the more 'demure' of the free-reeds - although wanting to avoid any stereotyping, and since I've no knowledge of the origin of this outlook, if true. Also, at one time or another, harp and flute were/are regarded as somehow being more or less 'effeminate,' or otherwise more associated with female players.

[onassis]

I think that the dynamic has been changing of late. There are more young female instrumentalists lighting up the acoustic music scene (Sierra Hull, Courtney Hartman, Brittany Haas, Sarah Jarosz, etc), and I think their influence is being felt. When I wander the campground at Galax these last few years, I see more and more girls and young women out there picking up a storm. The revolution has begun.

[James Rankine]

I went to a session the other night in an Irish pub in Brittany, France, billed as a British/Irish session. Turned out to be a singers session - women outnumbered the men. My wife's choir struggles to find enough men. Community singing seems to be more of a female thing and they prioritise it over other commitments. Maybe bluegrass with all the lead break stuff is just a bit too macho and competitive?

[multidon]

I play several different instruments, and with some of them, when there's a get together of some sort, the situation is reversed, mostly women and only a few men. Instruments displaying this phenomenon are:

Mountain dulcimer
Hammered dulcimer
Celtic harp

The hammered dulcimer was considered an instrument for demure ladies to play in the parlor during the 1700's in England and colonial America.

[foldedpath]

Community singing seems to be more of a female thing and they prioritise it over other commitments. Maybe bluegrass with all the lead break stuff is just a bit too macho and competitive?

That might partially explain the female ratio in trad sessions, where there are no solos and it's all unison playing. It's a cooperative setting by nature.

Although, subtle competition and dominance games are not always absent. It just shifts to other areas like whose favorite tunes get played, at what tempo, etc. There's a reason we have a term called the "alpha fiddler," and it has no gender restrictions.

[T.D.Nydn]

More power to you if you can play AND bake great cookies..

[dhergert]

I'm a male in three bands playing banjo... (While I jam a lot with it, my mandolin playing is not ready for public consumption in a band yet. )

One band has been in place for 8 years. It consists of 2 women and three men: One woman, who plays guitar and sings, is my wife. Our fiddler who also sings is a woman. Our mandolin player is a man. We're looking for a new bass player; the previous one is a man but we'd be equally happy to find a woman to play.

Another more active (and nimble) band has formed out of that band which is just the two women and myself.

The other band has about 15 members (and yes, it's somewhat of a melee) of which about 1/3rd are women.

Our specialty in all of the bands is Gospel music, so maybe that has something to do with it... But there is no lack of musically interested women, which is kind of nice.

The bluegrass association in this area has a number of other local bands which have one or more women in them. So it isn't that unusual out here (Southern California).

Thinking about it, I have to wonder if perhaps the well known travelling bands might have a bigger problem with mixed genders due to housing considerations. But that would depend on how the people in the band felt about their housing needs.

It might also simply be "tradition" that is molding this in peoples' minds. I'm not justifying it, but tradition is naturally resistant to change.

[JeffD]

I agree with the above sentiments that it may be a genre of music thing more than an instrument thing. In the (few) classical mandolin events I have attended I see many women mandolinners. And the female participation in traditional Irish, and the contra-dance repertory is pretty balanced, but as said before, distributed over many instruments. The mandolin workshops I have attended at Old Time Week at Swannanoa have been at least a third women.


But its likely pretty complicated, as it should be. Why, for example, are the mountain dulcimer jams I have seen overwhelmingly women, and female autoharp players seem to be the norm, with some exceptions. But my sampling may just be too small.

[farmerjones]

I think it all depend upon if you're wearing your half-empty glasses, or your half-full glasses what one sees.

The first thing that sprang to my mind was Alison Krause. 28 Grammys (WHAAAT?!?!?!)

But let's not forget the Queen Boss Lady of Bluegrass, Rhonda Vincent.


As I look around my circles, I pretty much see equal amounts.

[foldedpath]

But its likely pretty complicated, as it should be. Why, for example, are the mountain dulcimer jams I have seen overwhelmingly women, and female autoharp players seem to be the norm, with some exceptions. But my sampling may just be too small.

There do seem to be these instrument/gender groupings. With fiddle, autoharp, harp, chorus and the other examples, it may just be that so many guys are siphoned off into guitar land at various stages of life, that it leaves the women to dominate those other instruments.

On the other hand, you have pipers, which are almost all male in my area. I know only one local female piper, although I've seen another at a workshop. Other than that, the local piper community is a boy's club.

Probably it's a combination of the deep male-dominated history with the macho attraction of playing the loudest and (potentially) most obnoxious instrument possible. A classic guy thing. Pipes also need as much fussing and tinkering as fly fishing or rebuilding a carburetor, so it fits in with other mechanically-oriented guy hobbies. It takes some guts to wear those kilts though...

[pops1]

At our jams we have a good representation of women and an all girl band in the area. More of the dance callers around here are women. I am sure some area's don't have the representation we do, and some maybe more. I have two children, one of each, and both are musicians. Guess I did something right in my life.

[Charles E.]

Cindy, I wonder if it is a regional thing. When I lived in Maine years ago 95% of bluegrass and Old Time players were men. Women tended to play Canadian Trad or Irish music, or they were singer-song writers.

Where I live in North Carolina I see a lot of women in bluegrass and old time jams.

[mandocrucian]

Get out in that kitchen,
And rattle those pots and pans,
Get out in that kitchen,
And rattle those pots and pans,
Well, roll my breakfast,
'Cause I'm a hungry man.

I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
Well, you'll never do nothing,
To save your doggone soul.

Oh come on and get real.

One big ol' reason, especially in a lot of the BG scenes is simply..."What good ol' boy wants to get shown up by some woh-man?" Yeah little girl, you're welcome to sing pretty now and then, or plunk the doghouse bass behind your hubby, but don't go showing all us reg'lars up with no fancy picking on fiddle/guitar/mando/dobro/banjo etc.

Sure there are exceptions...like some girl who's a contest fiddler (and her daddy is one of the bands) but usually there's that whole male dominance thing in play. And women that can play don't particularly want to subject themselves to being shut out of the soloing/break circle and being treated second class. Why would (should) they return for all that "fun"?

My wife is a musician, and I've had woman students over the years, so I've seen it play out and heard the same type stories over and over.

[JAK]

Go to an outdoor bluegrass festival where Rhonda Vincent is performing. Chances are good you can jam with her after her last set of the evening.

[Randi Gormley]

Yeah, ITM sessions around here are about 2/3 men and 1/3 women drifting into 50/50 depending on where and when. I'm seldom the only woman in the room unless it's late at night and only the last 2 or three people are making music. Thinking back to various workshops and camps -- and the classical thing I do once a year -- certainly lots of women playing. Might be a bluegrass thing where often the women seem relegated to eye candy in the band, even the talented players, and generally wear either tight clothing or short skirts and low-cut blouses. That might be another reason why fewer women are in bluegrass jams -- the pressure to conform to sartorial expectations!

[allenhopkins]

I've played exclusively in mixed-gender groups since the mid-'70's; blues, Celtic, klezmer, folk, singer-songwriter. Played with some damned fine female instrumentalists, on guitar, fiddle, hammered dulcimer. The best and busiest fiddlers in our area tend to be women, Celtic, old-time, and bluegrass.

I've been super-impressed, in the bluegrass genre, going to performances by Lynn Morris (in City Limits, Whetstone Run and her own band), Alison Brown with Alison Krauss, and the influential Buffalo Gals (formerly Buffalo Chips) out of Syracuse, with Susie Monick, Martha Trachtenberg (who ended up in Skyline with Tony Trischka), et. al.

Jamming, though, seems to be another thing. I find a fair percentage of women at Celtic sessions, mostly flutists, harpists, fiddlers and hammered dulcimer players. Old time sessions have some, but fewer, fiddlers and guitarists mainly. Bluegrass sessions are much more heavily male, and I wonder if the good female instrumentalists don't adopt that genre, or if the sometimes competitive atmosphere may bother them. It bothers me a bit, too; the object shouldn't be to "out-play" the other participants, but to create a musically satisfying overall ambience.

There is a residual, declining viewpoint that bluegrass is a "man's music," possibly based on its early history (one can always overlook Sally Forrester and Bessie Lee Mauldin, I guess), possibly on the standard bluegrass vocal arrangements, normally set up for male voices only. The recent prominence of Krauss and Vincent should be laying that stereotype to rest -- but, as in so many other areas, there's a strong conservative strain among bluegrass fandom that may have an influence on women who enjoy the music and want to participate in it. My chromosomes make me unable to look at the issue from the feminine perspective, but I, for one, would gladly welcome more female musicians at jams and sessions.

[Mandobart]

Too often I am the only representative of my gender at the jam (OT, BG). I have asked the women who sometimes come why they don't come more often. Their reasons involve other obligations: relatives in town, errands to run, work to finish, soccer practice.The men have families and jobs but prioritize music, to getting to the darn jam!

Yep, those are pretty much the same reasons I skip a lot of jams. Just this year:

I skipped my local bluegrass club's festival due to a family vacation that had to happen at the same time.
I skipped my folklife society's annual Labor Day festival (first one I've missed in about 10 years) to help my son move in to his dorm at college 4 hours away.
I skipped Djangofest NW (nearly my favorite fest all year) to help my daughter move into her college dorm.
I've skipped my weekly bluegrass jam for the past two months to attend dance classes with my wife that have to happen in the same time slot. She absolutely will not attend any musical events with me. She would prefer I not even tune up at home.
I skipped going to the Spokane Mandolin Congress to stay home with a dog recovering from surgery, so my wife could help out her mother four states away who is dying of cancer (provided the rural MN healthcare providers don't kill her first).
I've got tix and resrvations for Wintergrass but I'm pretty sure I'll have to cancel. I'll be sure to offer these up to cafe members ( but definitely NOT to anyone who considers me selfish and spoiled due to my choice to be born male).

[Jess L.]

I got turned off by some of the lyrics in many genres of music, where they insist on singing all the time instead of just playing instrumental dance music. Depends on which songs they choose, of course.

Other genres, such as Irish sessions, are mostly instrumental (at least that's been my experience, never heard anyone sing at an Irish session although I've been told that it's common elsewhere -- regional differences I guess) so there is no 'poetry' (lyrics) to ruin otherwise good music.

So, in addition to the appeal of the ITM (Irish trad) cooperative unison sound (no "breaks" or solos) as already mentioned by other posters above, the lack of gratuitous lyrics is one of the reasons I bailed from a *different* music scene (eons ago, back in the stone age lol) and did the Irish session thing instead, for a few years. It seemed to me that ITM was more about focusing on the music itself, not singling out individuals for 'star' power, although that doesn't mean you can get by being a slouch (you can't), but the competition is not against other people. Rather, you compete with *yourself* to play as best you can, every time, to improve the overall group sound. At least that has been my impressions.

And oldtime fiddle/banjo dance band music, again this may be a regional thing, but I've heard very little singing there either, it's mostly instrumental.

Suspiciously, perhaps (or not) supporting my little hypothesis about lyrics, I've always seen plenty of women in both the ITM sessions and the oldtime jams I've been to, even going back quite a few years (1960s/1970s).

Yes, I realize that, generally speaking, the non-musician public expects to hear lyrics with music, that's probably why so many financially-successful bands have singers, because that's what non-musicians want to hear (especially if they're drunk ha), they can identify with the singer. Although I suspect that there's a rather low percentage of non-musicians who actually pay attention to, or care about, the words in the lyrics of lots of songs.

Don't shoot me, I'm not anti-singing, there are plenty of excellent songs (y'know, music with lyrics, as opposed to tunes that are purely instrumental) that I really enjoy.

Of course the older trad songs sometimes have a more guy-oriented viewpoint since most (?) of the music back then was written/performed my men -- not that there's anything wrong with that, it just depends on what the words are and what the message (if any) is.

But, I have to clarify lest anyone think I'm reverse-sexist (no), that IMO some of the modern female-written songs go too far in the *other* direction, I do not want to hear *anyone* get verbally bashed/dissed/whatever in song lyrics, whether men or women. We walked out of a karaoke thing one time because that particular night had been taken over by several ladies who insisted on choosing the most awful depressing anti-love songs, I guess they were recovering from bad breakups and it was probably cathartic (helpful) for them to sing that sort of thing, but for us in the audience it was a complete buzz-kill (natural buzz, we were drinking diet 7-up lol). A few scattered songs would've been ok, misery is part of life after all, but not a steady onslaught of hate-filled musical misery for a solid hour plus.

Of course, when one pays attention to song lyrics, that considerably narrows down the field of listenable music.

[Charles E.]

How did a "lyrics" post get in this "so few women" thread?

[jaycat]

Get out in that kitchen,
And rattle those pots and pans,
Get out in that kitchen,
And rattle those pots and pans,
Well, roll my breakfast,
'Cause I'm a hungry man.

I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
I said, shake, rattle, and roll,
Well, you'll never do nothing,
To save your doggone soul.

Oh come on and get real.

One big ol' reason, especially in a lot of the BG scenes is simply..."What good ol' boy wants to get shown up by some woh-man?" Yeah little girl, you're welcome to sing pretty now and then, or plunk the doghouse bass behind your hubby, but don't go showing all us reg'lars up with no fancy picking on fiddle/guitar/mando/dobro/banjo etc.

Sure there are exceptions...like some girl who's a contest fiddler (and her daddy is one of the bands) but usually there's that whole male dominance thing in play. And women that can play don't particularly want to subject themselves to being shut out of the soloing/break circle and being treated second class. Why would (should) they return for all that "fun"?

My wife is a musician, and I've had woman students over the years, so I've seen it play out and heard the same type stories over and over.

This is why I left Virginia at an early age.