The classical music profession: demographic background of conservatoire staff and members of orchestras in Germany and the UK

McClure, Brigid and Wright , Fiona and Scharff, Christina (2017). The classical music profession: demographic background of conservatoire staff and members of orchestras in Germany and the UK. [Data Collection]. Colchester, Essex: UK Data Archive. 10.5255/UKDA-SN-852457

Work in the cultural industries is frequently described as work that you can’t help doing. However, research has shown that such work is often precarious and that the cultural sector is marked by inequalities.

This project aims to add to our understanding of cultural work by conducting research on the classical music profession in Berlin and London. In doing so, the study addresses gaps in existing research that relate to the working lives of classical musicians, inequalities in the classical music profession, and the ways in which cultural work is affected by gender and its urban context.

The study generated new knowledge in three key areas. First, it contributed to our understanding of inequalities in the classical music profession. Given the dearth of data on the demographic background of classical musicians, the study collected quantitative data on the backgrounds of orchestral players and conservatoire teachers. It complemented these quantitative findings with in-depth study of existing qualitative data on the ways in which musicians make sense of on-going inequalities and how particular industry practices, such as the emphasis placed on self-promotion, disadvantage women. Second, the research explored how female, classical musicians respond to the ethos of entrepreneurialism. The study identified ten different ways in which the research participants took on an entrepreneurial outlook by, for example, talking about themselves as a ‘commodity’ that has to be marketed. Third, the study traced the ups and downs of the classical music profession by exploring how musicians cope with insecure work conditions in order to pursue work they feel passionate about. The contrast between Berlin and London was particularly striking in this context: research participants based in Berlin felt that their lives as artists were tenable, whereas musicians in London often shared stories of hardship and anxiety.

Data description (abstract)

The data presented here contains information on the gender of conservatoire staff and orchestral players and, where available, on their ethnic background. The data is based on publicly available information, which was retrieved from the websites of conservatoires and orchestras. Information on conservatoire staff was collected for the UK and Germany whereas information on orchestral players was only collected for the UK. This is because the German Association of Orchestras (DOV) publishes data on the proportion of male and female players, whereas the relevant industry body in the UK, the Association of British Orchestras (ABO) does not collect information on the demographic background of their players.

Data creators:

Creator Name	Affiliation	ORCID (as URL)
McClure Brigid	King's College London
Wright Fiona	Cambridge University
Scharff Christina	King's College London

Sponsors:

ESRC

Grant reference:

ES/K008765/1

Topic classification:

Labour and employment
Society and culture

Keywords:

Classical music profession, Conservatoire Staff Germany/UK, Members of orchestras UK

Project title:

Young, female and entrepreneurial? Exploring the working lives of young women in the classical music profession

Alternative title:

Demographic background of conservatoire staff and members of orchestras in Germany and the UK

Grant holders:

Christina Scharff

Project dates:

From	To
1 October 2013	30 June 2016

Date published:

21 Dec 2016 15:09

Last modified:

14 Jul 2017 14:09

Coverage and Methodology

Collection period:

Date from:	Date to:
1 May 2014	1 November 2014

Geographical area:

Germany and United Kingdom

Country:

United Kingdom, Germany (October 1990-)

Spatial unit:

European Union Geographies > NUTS-I Areas
Other

Data collection method:

The data set for the British orchestras includes the 61 orchestras listed as full members of the Association of British Orchestras (see http://www.abo.org.uk/members/directory.aspx). Where available (in 43 out of 61 orchestras), demographic data was collected in relation to orchestral members’ name, gender, ethnic background, instrument, instrument group, and position, including conductors and artistic directors. Job sharers are also listed with ‘JS’ included in brackets after each name. The spreadsheet includes a column for instrument family and position: String, Woodwind, Brass, Percussion including keyboards, Conductors, artistic/musical Directors.

The data set for the British conservatoires includes the 8 conservatoires listed by the Conservatoires UK Admission Service (see http://www.cukas.ac.uk/) and is based on staff listings by department (eg. strings, woodwind, brass, percussion, keyboard etc.). Demographic data was collected in relation to staff members’ name, gender, ethnic background, instrument, instrument group, and position. ‘Vocal studies, opera and musical theatre’, as well as ‘Composition, production and music technology’ were combined due to overlap of staff roles and job titles. Job sharers are also listed with ‘JS’ included in brackets after each name. For comparability with the orchestra spreadsheet, the conservatoire spreadsheet includes a column for instrument family (String, Woodwind, Brass, Percussion, Keyboards, Conducting).

For Germany, the data set is based on the 24 conservatoires that are members of the German Association of Music Colleges. (http://www.die-deutschen-musikhochschulen.de/ueber-uns/mitglieder/start/). There are two spreadsheets: one contains data on the gender and ethnic background of staff members, whilst the other spreadsheet groups the information by gender and instrument. Note that ‘Performance’ relates to ‘Szenischer Unterricht’ and that music pedagogy and music therapy are subsumed under ‘Musikwissenschaft’. As compared to the spreadsheets on British conservatoires and orchestras, the names of individual staff members are not listed in the spreadsheets on German conservatoires.

Attribution of gender: Where the gender was not obvious through photograph and/or name, a brief Google search was conducted. This method does, however, contain a margin of error.

Attribution of ethnic background: Where photographs and/or biographical details were provided on the ensemble/conservatoire website, an assessment of ethnicity was made, based on the photograph, name and birthplace. In cases where only a few photographs were missing, a Google search was conducted. Again, this method does contain a margin of error. In the UK, many ensembles/organisations did not include photographs or biographical details, which explains why ethnic background has only been identified in relation to 17 orchestras (629 orchestra members) and 1345 out of 1787 conservatoire staff. This is relevant because it explains why the totals (male/female) versus (white/BAME) do not add up in these spreadsheets.
The Arts Council, and other relevant cultural organisations use the two categories 'White' and 'BAME'. These categories have been used here for comparability.

Observation unit:

Individual, Organization

Kind of data:

Numeric

Type of data:

Cross-national survey data, Other surveys

Resource language:

English, German

Access and Administration

Data sourcing, processing and preparation:

The data is derived from publicly available information, namely the websites of orchestras and conservatoires in Germany and the UK. For anonymisation, the following changes were made to the data: - Attribution of gender and ethnic background to named, individual staff members/orchestral players was taken out. The totals, however, were left unchanged. - Numbers lower than 5 (excluding ‘0’) were changed to ‘<5’. Again, the totals were left unchanged. Detailed analysis of the data is available in the publicly accessible research report ‘Equality and Diversity in the Classical Music Profession’ at: http://blogs.kcl.ac.uk/young-female-and-entrepreneurial/files/2014/02/Equality-and-Diversity-in-the-Classical-Music-Profession.pdf.

Rights owners:

Name	Affiliation	ORCID (as URL)
Scharff Christina	King's College London

Contact:

Name	Email	Affiliation	ORCID (as URL)
Christina Scharff, Christina	christina.scharff@kcl.ac.uk	King's College London	Unspecified

Notes on access:

The Data Collection only consists of metadata and documentation as the data could not be archived due to legal, ethical or commercial constraints. For further information, please contact the contact person for this data collection.

Publisher:

UK Data Archive

Last modified:

14 Jul 2017 14:09