Ludwig van Toronto

Breaking news: CBC classical music gender equality article sparks outrage from VSO’s Bramwell Tovey

Michael Vincent

bramwell

 

The controversy started with an article written by CBC’s Michael Morreale, titled “Classical music’s shocking gender gap”.

In the article, Morreale asserts that despite very healthy numbers of female music students in Canadian universities, talented women are being prevented from having the successful careers they deserve.

Morreale cites statistics from the 2014-15 orchestra season from orchestras in Canada’s four largest cities (Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Ottawa). Using the season guides, he tallied the ratio of female to male soloists in the performance of orchestra concertos.

Male vs. Female concerto statistics published by CBC

In response to the article, Vancouver Symphony Orchestra conductor Bramwell Tovey has launched a series of tweets while on vacation in Tuscany, blasting the article as inaccurate, sensationalist, plagiarized, and borderline libel.

He demanded an apology from Morreale, who has thus far remained silent.

Here are some of his tweets:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you can see, this is an incredible rant from one of Classical music’s most esteemed and respected conductors.

The question is, is he right? Is this article simply looking to exploit an issue, or is there something more to this?

All in all, I think some fact checking is in order – and Musical Toronto will be looking into this. I have also personally contacted Michael Morreale for a response and will update this space as the story continues.

Who says Canada is boring?

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Clarification: The re-tweet (RT)  dated March 19th, 2014 is not related to the CBC article in question. It is instead a response to a previous article published on Feb. 24 2014, by Michael Morreale  – “How the 90’s almost destroyed classical music, from the Three Tenors, to Vanessa-Mae to Sarah Brightman.” Also another tweet posted by Tovey on March 19, which stated Morreale’s article is Toronto-centric, was in fact also in reference to Morreale’s Feb 24, 2014 article.

 

Michael Vincent