SUPPLY AND DEMAND: TRAINING ENOUGH OR TOO MANY IN MUSIC?

I was trained to be a professional musician but learned early on that the competitive nature of the business and the stress and other major challenges it would pose, was not worth the sacrifice. Fortunately I love to teach and ultimately found my way into arts administration. I consider myself to be extremely fortunate to be able to continue teaching, performing and collect a paycheck every month. I have the best of all worlds.

But I work in one of the major training schools for musicians, dancers, and actors. I use my rudimentary mathematical skills to estimate how many aspiring artists graduate each year and how many jobs are available. If five oboists graduated from CCM next year and there were 500 other colleges graduating five oboists each, there would be 2,500 oboists looking for playing jobs. There may be a hundred available a year? My point is not to spout statistics justifying the difficult obstacles us oboists face, but rather to show that in the arts, one can expect the supply to exceed the demand.

But let’s look at this from a different perspective – that of the young burgeoning musician. A musician who may be in her 3rd or 4th year of playing an instrument and ready to perform in an ensemble. WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

In our community, there are at least 20, yes 20, ensembles that young string players can play in, that are outside of any school program. These are for students anywhere from 8 years through high school. Cincinnati is blessed to be a culturally rich city; arts education opportunities for students reflect this social value that makes us very proud.
BUT WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Who is introducing music to young children? Whose responsibility is it? Why are some students able to access the arts and many aren’t? We should be able to populate these 20 ensembles easily and fill 20 more, if music education was a core value in individual families and in schools. Years ago, schools had orchestra and band programs. Kids would get introduced to music by general music teachers and then given the opportunity to choose to study an instrument at an affordable price for the family. Today, few string programs exist in elementary schools and as one goes up the arts food chain, fewer and fewer musicians are products of the public schools, but rather of those families with a commitment to the arts and the income to pay for it.

We are already experienciing the negative impact on diminishing arts education in the schools. It won’t be too long, before higher education institutions will also find it nearly impossible to fill their classes with the best and brightest performers. And there may be a time when there won’t be a surplus of musicians because there will be no demand, because orchestras won’t exist.

I can’t think of a better way for a child to experience learning, in its most fundamental shape, than by learning to play an instrument. The physicality of playing, the muscle and mind memory training, the group dynamics, the responsibility and independent learning that is expected are invaluable. So when are we going to insist that schools bring back strong arts programs?

Be an advocate for the arts. Go to www.cincyartsalliance.org where a bunch of arts educators in Cincinnati are committed to ensuring that we do what we can to get kids and the arts connected. Help us ensure that we keep a healthy supply of artists in our country. For artists are resourceful – they may not find a “job” as we know it, but they will survive and they will be satisfied in a way that many of us only dream about.