WOMEN IN MUSIC
Growing Up as a Girl Child in America: Part 13
Girls don’t compete with boys in music and shy kids finish last
My nieces recently attended a Taylor Swift concert along with about 50,000 others.
There may be no other sign that times have changed since I was a teen than how some female performers and artists have been able to forge their own creative path in music.
When we moved to Mentone and I began third grade, our school had a music teacher and we were all asked to choose musical instruments. I wanted to play flute, but those were all taken by the time it was my turn to pick. Violin was too hard, some of the other kids said, so I picked clarinet.
I brought home a battered old plastic clarinet with a frayed reed and decaying pads.
Our wonky, squeaky orchestra
Somehow I managed to coax decent sounds out of the thing.
I kept playing, and by middle school, I was good enough to head the first section in our school’s creaky, wonky, squeaky orchestra. My memory tells me we played “The Volga River Boatman’s Song,” but probably also “This is My Country” and “Jingle Bells.”
