“The trumpet still attracts mostly men. But a growing number of female musicians have discovered the challenge and appeal” of the instrument, writes Dawn DeCwikiel-Kane in Saturday’s (7/8) Winston-Salem Journal (N.C.). “At the Eastern Music Festival [in North Carolina] … among 10 trumpet students, two are female…. EMF has drawn female trumpet students and faculty members for a long time. Karin Bliznik of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra studied there.” Twenty-year-old trumpet player Claire Hendrickson is studying at EMF this summer with Judith Saxton, who “has played principal trumpet with the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra and the Wichita Symphony Orchestra…. Susan Slaughter, one of Saxton’s mentors … played in the brass section of the St. Louis Symphony for 41 years and led it for 37…. Her experiences prompted her in 1992 to form the International Women’s Brass Conference…. Slaughter said she has seen more women as principal players in brass sections of major orchestras…. Among [the International Trumpet Guild’s] 4,500 members, there is still a majority of males, said its president, Brian Evans of Australia. But its incoming president is a woman.” Evans notes that the guild is “pleased not to be a boys’ club” and has “a conscious focus on diversity and inclusion.”
Click here to read Symphony magazine’s Spring 2016 article about musical instruments and gender.
Posted July 10, 2017
