Street Queens: The Performance of Gender in New Orleans Brass Bands (Video)
- Yeah, so this is just--this is part of my, my master's thesis research.
- It's very much in progress and I would appreciate any feedback
- that you can give me at the end of this.
- We'll have, like a little Q&A and yeah, so here we go.
- The musical traditions of New Orleans are largely patriarchal.
- As the predominant sonic signifier of New Orleans, the brass band amplifies
- this gender bias more than any other musical medium in the city.
- Brass band literature's thus far focused almost exclusively on black men
- and partially due to the relative absence of women in brass bands,
- neglects to view gender as a category of analysis.
- This presentation seeks to introduce gender
- as a key element to brass band research
- by studying the only current exception to male dominance in this musical genre,
- an all female brass band called the Original Pinettes Brass Band.
- Drawing from ethnography and interviews with the Pinettes,
- as well as an eclectic smattering of secondary literature,
- I will argue that as a group they subvert gender norms
- through the introduction of female gendered songs into the repertoire
- and the appropriation of canonical brass band songs
- with misogynistic, lyrical content.
- Using their songs as tools of subversion,
- they work within and against the brass band patriarchy.
- Citing Michel Foucault, Patricia Collins has shown
- that Afrocentric feminist knowledge is a subjugated knowledge.
- In Collin's work, she adeptly makes the case
- that black women, like the Pinettes,
- have been excluded from the control of knowledge as a means of empowerment.
- In consequence, they have created alternative epistemology of knowledge
- outside of the academy through artistic endeavors like literature and music.
- I see the Pinettes music as a form of knowledge
- that, when contextualized by interviews and ethnography, can tell us a lot
- about their collective identity as black women.
- Feminist jazz historian, Sherrie Tucker, has rightfully observed that, quote,
- "Music is one of the places where people learn gender,
- "where ideas about masculinity and femininity
- "(intersected with other categories such as race, etc.) are learned, taught,
- debated, consolidated and challenged as a part of social organization" end quote.
- I actively seek to engage the Pinettes music as a form of knowledge
- that can speak to their experience
- as black women making music in a patriarchal community of musicians.
- I hope to use my privilege to give the Pinettes another stage
- on which to blow their horns, engaging in a call and response dialog with me
- personally, as well as the body of knowledge in which my work is situated.
- Before I go any further, I just want to play a little clip of the Pinettes
- playing a standard brass band tune called "Let's Go Get 'Em" that's adopted
- from the Mardi Gras Indians
- [Pinettes performing "Let's Go Get 'Em"].
- Yeah.
- The New Orleans brass band
- tradition stems from the jazz funerals of the late 19th century.
- Bands primarily played hymns and spirituals, but now brass band music
- frequently engages with contemporary music genres, translating songs
- through archaic brass instruments in the streets and on the stage.
- The New Orleans Brass Band repertoire is fairly self-contained.
- Original brass band tunes stem from a handful of veteran
- bands in the scene, most notably the Rebirth Brass Band.
- Cover tunes, if not introduced by veteran brass bands, tend to be ephemeral.
- For example, last year, Daft Punk's "Get Lucky"
- was a hit for younger bands in the brass band scene.
- And this year, Pharrell's "Happy" seems possibly poised to take the reins.
- Like all other brass bands, the Pinettes have retuned the contemporary music
- of their generations, plural, to fit within the brass band tradition.
- Like the Hot 8 covering "Ghost Town" by The Specials,
- The Soul Rebels covering "Get Lucky" by Daft Punk,
- or Rebirth covering "Casanova" by LeVert,
- the Pinettes have also brought their own popular tunes
- that they identify, identify with into the tradition.
- They play pop music from the eighties that conjures images of powerful
- female vocalists, songs like "I'm Every Woman" by Chaka Khan,
- "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" by Cyndi Lauper
- "Valerie" by Amy Winehouse,
- "The Boogie Oogie Oogie " by A Taste of Honey,
- and "Cause I Love You Baby" by Deniece Williams come to mind.
- The Pinettes regularly reach outside the standard brass band repertoire
- and popular radio hits, primarily choosing cover songs
- that project these varying images of femininity.
- When they acoustically project these female gendered songs,
- it is done through brass and percussion instruments
- that could not be more heavily male gendered.
- In doing this, they challenge the aggressively masculine world
- of brass band music.
- In thinking about the transcendent aspects of the Pinettes' repertoire,
- I find Ingrid Monson's idea of intermusicality helpful
- quote "Each individual (audience member)" she's referring to
- "has a personal listening world that intersects to a greater or lesser
- "degree with those of other participants in any particular musical tradition.
- "Some jazz listeners know more repertory than others, which comes as no surprise.
- "This audience stratification by aural familiarity
- "creates groups of people sharing musical bonds
- that are denser at the center than near the edge of any particular category."
- The Pinettes musical selections are not in line with other brass bands,
- and this swings their audience out to the- to the edge of the brass band community,
- dragging the Pinettes who collectively inhabit the role of both
- audience member and performer, along with them.
- From the peripheries of the brass band community,
- they manage to introduce their music
- to diverse audiences and extend music of the larger brass band community
- to audiences that might another--might not otherwise have exposure to it.
- Their position reflects what Collins would call
- their outsider within stance as black women.
- They're duly marginalized by race and gender.
- And while they share knowledge in the form of songs of the black community,
- they're simultaneously excluded from its production.
- Furthermore, their musically articulated collective identity as women allows them
- to cut across the social divides of race and class,
- making gender a totalizing identifier.
- I've seen them play at a fundraiser for an all female dance club,
- and they frequently play for fundraisers
- that support causes that have a direct bearing on women's lives.
- Some causes that come to mind include breast cancer research,
- services for victims of domestic violence, and that sort of thing.
- Other brass bands don't incorporate the Pinettes original songs
- or covers into their repertoire,
- making for a sort of one sided dialog in this community organized by repertoire.
- In the latest Society for Ethnomusicology Journal,
- actually the second latest Society for Ethnomusicology Journal,
- Harris Berger commented that,
- quote, "The notion that music has meaning or social dynamics that we would call
- "political is not provocative in the field of ethnomusicology today.
- We all agree that music is a key medium through which identities emerge,"
- end quote.
- More than this emergence though, which implies a passive construction of identity
- people strategically emphasize and deploy categories of identity
- in order to make a political statement.
- In the case of the Pinettes,
- use their collective, collective identity advantageously.
- While the Pinettes as a group might have different ideas about feminism
- and the politics of gender within the brass band patriarchy,
- they unite in a brass band under the identifier of woman in a defined act
- of strategic essentialism, that disregards intergroup differences
- in favor of a united front for social change.
- Trombonist, Dee Holmes, put it quite succinctly when she told me,
- quote, "We promote female power" end quote.
- As astute business, women the Pinettes very consciously, leverage
- their collective identity as women as a means of marketing themselves
- and carving out a niche in the larger brass ban--brass band market.
- Strategic essentialism in this case is in close conversation
- with what the business world would term strategic differentiation.
- What follows is analyses of some of the ways the Pinettes use their music
- to puncture the brass band patriarchy and subvert the gender norms of the genre.
- These songs illustrate some of the issues the Pinettes face and are indicative
- of how they use their songs as tools of--of subversion.
- One of the most notable brass band covers of the Pinettes play
- is the Rebirth Brass Band's cover of LeVert's "Casanova".
- It is among the most frequently requested brass band tunes,
- and as such, is required material for any brass band.
- In an interview with trumpeter Veronique Dorsey,
- she told me the refusal to play Casanova
- at someone's wedding would end with the customer demanding a refund.
- A hit from 1987, Casanova was retuned
- to the brass band tradition by Rebirth and altered significantly.
- I'm going to play an excerpt from the original version
- and then follow it up with Rebirth before talking
- about how the Pinettes use the song.
- Oh, that's right. See here.
- [LeVert's "Casanova"] ♪ I ain't much no Casanova. ♪
- ♪ Me and Romeo ain't never been friends. ♪
- ♪ Can't you see how much I really love you? ♪
- ♪ Gonna sing it to you time and time again. ♪
- ♪ Oh Casanova. ♪
- ♪ Casanova. ♪
- Yeah. Then the Rebirth version here, which is quite a bit different.
- Just note the lyrical differences.
- [Rebirth's cover of "Casanova"]
- ♪ I ain't much no Casanova. ♪
- ♪ Me and Romeo ain't never been friends. ♪
- ♪ Can't you see how much I want to fuck you? ♪
- ♪ Come and sing it to you time and time again. ♪
- ♪ Oh, bitch bend over ♪
- ♪ Take 'em off, take ya motherfuckin' drawers off ♪
- ♪ bitch bend over ♪
- ♪ Take 'em off, take ya motherfuckin' drawers off ♪
- ♪ Oh, bitch bend over. ♪
- In what Patricia Collins has termed either-or dichotomous thinking,
- people, ideas, and things are categorized in terms of difference to one another.
- They gain meaning only in relation to that,
- which is on the flip side of the opposition.
- Dichotomies are divided
- between black and white, female and male, culture and nature, etc.
- These oppositional dichotomies are inherently unstable
- and the result of this instability is subordination.
- Objectification is central to creating this opposition
- and the resulting subordination.
- In the retuned lyrics of Casanova, women are sexually objectified
- as the other and viewed as an object to be manipulated and controlled.
- As Catharine MacKinnon so bluntly put it, quote, "Man fucks woman.
- Subject, verb, object." end quote,
- existing within the confines of the either-or dichotomous thinking
- that characterizes Western social thought,
- African-American women have turned to arts and literature to find their voice.
- Angela Davis has noted that varied forms of musical expression,
- including spirituals and hip hop, have formed a continuum of struggle,
- which is at once esthetic and political.
- And that that comment there actually kind of blurs the dichotomy
- between functionality and aesthetic. So yeah.
- Anyway, next, I'm going to play a video clip of the Pinettes
- dealing with this tricky subject--this tricky subject matter,
- or maybe object matter, in the playing of Casanova.
- [Pinettes' cover of "Casanova"] ♪ I ain't much, no Casanova. ♪
- ♪ I said well me and Romeo ain't never been friends. ♪
- ♪ I said can't you see how much I really love ya? ♪
- ♪ I wanna sing it to you time and time-- ♪
- ♪ they want it hot butt-naked. ♪
- ♪ Oh, Casanova ♪
- ♪ Take it off, take all your clothes off ♪
- ♪ Casanova ♪
- ♪ take it off, take it off, take it off, take it off, take it off ♪
- ♪ Oh, Casanova ♪
- ♪ woo woo, hey♪
- ♪ Casanova ♪
- ♪ come on, come on, put it on, put it on ♪
- Yeah. So when the Pinettes play the song instead of--instead of
- singing "bitch bend over," they replace it with the original lyric "oh Casanova,"
- and instead of "Can you see how much I want to fuck you?" the Pinettes
- revert the lyrics to the original, "Can you see how much I really love you?"
- The Pinettes also retain Rebirth's instruction to take your clothes off.
- Although the instruction is delivered without expletives
- and in doing so they invert the gendered meaning.
- In reference to trombonist Nicole Elwood's insistence on including
- the lyrical additions, trumpeter Véronique Dorsey told me, with a chuckle,
- quote "But she's talking about a man, not what Rebirth was saying" end quote.
- As women, the Pinettes choose to counter controlling
- images of blackness that differ greatly from their male colleagues.
- Specifically, the Pinettes push back against racist constructions
- of female sexuality that are rooted in the history of slavery.
- And Patricia Collins, seminal or rather ovulary work--sorry,
- I decided to keep the joke in there,
- black feminist thought,
- she carefully outlined the controlling images of black womanhood,
- the work to dictate the behavior and identities of black women.
- They include the images of the tragic mulatto,
- the comic mammy, the welfare mother, and the hypersexualized Jezebel.
- While one could take the stance that the use of "take all your clothes off"
- in the Pinettes' version of Casanova
- simply adheres to the controlling image of the Jezebel,
- I think this really doesn't take into account the historical complexities
- that have kind of led us to this point.
- In Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham's article,
- African-American Women's History and the Metalanguage of Race,
- she shows that black women responded to assaults
- on black sexuality and the representation of sexuality through its absence.
- This super morality became the way black women,
- and particularly black women in the South,
- dealt with the hypersexualized image forced upon them.
- While the Pinettes push back against objectification in the first half
- of the outlined passage by reverting to the LeVert lyrics, they also make it clear
- that they have no qualms about being sexual.
- Another prominent cover, the Pinettes play, is "Valerie"
- by neo soul--British neo soul singer Amy Winehouse.
- [Amy Winehouse's "Valerie"] ♪ Cos since I've come on home, ♪
- ♪ Well my body's been a mess. ♪
- ♪ And I miss your ginger hair. ♪
- ♪ And the way you like to dress. ♪
- ♪ Won't you come on over? ♪
- ♪ Stop making a fool out of me. ♪
- ♪ Why don't you come on over, Valerie? ♪
- ♪ Valerie. ♪
- ♪ Valerie. ♪
- Rather than calling the song "Valerie",
- however, the Pinettes have changed the title and hook to "Baby".
- [Pinettes' "Baby"] ♪ Since I've come on home, ♪
- ♪ Well my body's been a mess. ♪
- ♪ And I miss your ginger hair. ♪
- ♪ And the way you like to dress. ♪
- ♪ Won't you come on over? ♪
- ♪ Stop making a fool out of me. ♪
- ♪ Why don't you come on over, baby? ♪
- ♪ My baby. ♪
- ♪ My baby. ♪
- ♪ My baby. ♪
- By changing the name of the song from "Valerie" to "Baby",
- the Pinettes have removed both sex and sexuality from the conversation.
- Were they to sing a song of lost love about a woman,
- their male colleagues might label them lesbians,
- and this accusation of lesbianism would ostensibly carry with it
- a dismissive quality.
- When I asked Christie about changing the name and the hook of the song,
- she responded with, quote,
- "We didn't want anyone to have mixed emotions," end quote.
- Christie used ambiguity as a form of self-censorship
- because she wasn't sure how it would respond
- to an outright discussion about sexuality.
- Her active opposition to being labeled a lesbian,
- stems from a history of women musicians being perceived as sexually suspect.
- To once again quote Sherrie Tucker,
- quote, "Women in all girl bands were sexualized throughout their careers.
- "Those who played non-traditional instruments arouse suspicions
- that they must be nontraditional in other ways as well," end quote.
- Still, though, given the subversive--subversiveness of the Pinettes
- very existence,
- why would Christie make the decision to censor the band in this regard?
- There exists an inherent self-censorship when any hierarchy invades
- interpersonal relationships, and this includes not only Christie's
- relationship with me, but also with other brass band musicians.
- The Pinettes have, in a sense, attempted to remove sexuality from the conversation
- in order to focus on their collective identity as women.
- As I alluded to before, this is an example of what Gayatri Spivak has termed
- strategic essentialism, in which intergroup differences
- are temporarily put aside in order to achieve social action.
- Barbara Smith has cited this maintaining straightness
- as a last resort for black women.
- Speaking of intergroup differences brings me to my last musical example.
- The 23 years the Pinettes have been together
- has not been without discontinuities.
- Originally called the Pinettes Brass Band, they were forced to add the term
- "Original" to the front of the band name because former band members recognized
- the success of the band and wanted to stake a claim in--to the band name.
- Christie confronted the issue, matter of factly,
- [Audio clip of Christie Jourdain]
- - "Well, the only original members in the band
- "is Casandra French and Demaris Holmes.
- "I'm a Pinette.
- "What happened was the band members
- "that decided to quit--we were doing well, they saw we were doing well,
- "so they started calling around telling Jazz Fest and Tipitina's,
- "'There's a lawsuit going with this band. They're stealing our name.
- "I have papers on it so they cannot perform there.'
- "So Jazz Fest came to me and said
- "'We don't care what the problem is.
- "If y'all need to perform here, y'all need to get that corrected.
- If you can't be in there, change your name.'"
- -The use of the term original
- was a clever way of avoiding legal fees in court by changing the name
- while still maintaining the rightful claim as originators of the band.
- After Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the band endured a period of inactivity,
- and the regrouping of the band, with Christie as the leader,
- makes for a historical gray area that gave room for past band members
- to claim ownership of the band name.
- Christie made it clear to me that this period in the band's history
- affected her emotionally as she struggled to make the distinction between friends
- and business.
- The issue carried with it such an emotional weight
- that Christie arrived one day at practice upset and went off to pen
- the lyrics to an original song that dealt head on with the feud.
- [Pinettes' "Get a Life"] ♪ Won't you get a life, ♪
- ♪ 'cause y'all some miserable bitches. ♪
- ♪ Miserable bitches! ♪
- ♪ Fuck you, don't be mad. ♪
- ♪ 'Cause we're the Original Pinettes. ♪
- ♪ The Original Pinettes! ♪
- ♪ Get a life, do you and imma do me. ♪
- ♪ Get a life, do you and imma do me. ♪
- ♪ Get a life, do you and imma do me. ♪
- ♪ Bitch. ♪
- ♪ Get a life, do you and imma do me. ♪
- ♪ Get a life, do you and imma do me. ♪
- ♪ Get a life, do you and imma do me. ♪
- ♪ Bitch. ♪
- ♪♪
- So the meaning of the text is quite clear
- when you know the context of its writing.
- Contextualized, however, in the larger brass band community,
- the song takes on new meaning.
- In the fierceful competitive realm of brass band music,
- bands play tunes like "Let's Go Get 'Em" and
- "You Don't Want To Go To War" as means of intimidating other bands.
- When recontextualized, "Get a Life" takes on the same competitive quality.
- Furthermore, the word bitch carries double meaning in reference--
- in reference to women.
- The term either denotes a woman with an attitude that is undesirable
- or that doesn't conform to one's normative concepts of how a woman should act.
- For the Pinettes, I suspect the term carries with it a sense of betrayal.
- As the former bandmates attempted to erode the communal ties
- that are crucial to the subversion of the brass band patriarchy.
- When directed at a male band though,
- the term bitch denotes a man who holds less power than a woman.
- The use of the term in this context suggests the Pinettes,
- empowered by their music, rule the brass band community.
- Using the song they imagine themselves as all powerful subjects or street queens.
- In conclusion, the subversive songs of the Pinettes
- force us to reconsider the domain of brass band music.
- Not only is one where brass band instruments articulate power,
- but where gender is a primary element
- in the construction and the consolidation of this power.
- Thank you.
- [audience applause]
- Questions.
- I've got about 10 minutes or so.
- Anyone?
- Bruce?
- - [Bruce] A couple.
- One of the sort of central features of the narrative on gender and sex
- in jazz is, whether or not there any advantages to one or the other?
- Listening to this, the examples you selected,
- and of course, a lot of this depends on what your orientation
- [inaudible] feminism and when you came into it, might be.
- But the playing is every bit as good as any brass band
- I've heard, and singing is remarkably better.
- The vocals are really I think there's a strength there
- that deserves recognition because they really sing
- well and do the harmonies and everything.
- So I'm wondering where you fall on
- that issue, because some people say there should be no differentiation at all.
- But do you think there is a basis for making comparisons like that?
- - I mean, I don't think there's
- anything different about how men and women play music.
- I mean, they certainly hold their own.
- There's definitely a different,
- I mean, they're singing in different registers than men are.
- So there are a few musical qualities that are different.
- I'm not sure like--like where I fall in terms of
- I'm not sure what exactly you were getting at, sorry could you--
- - [Bruce] Well, in other words, is there some intrinsic advantage
- to being a woman in dealing with this material?
- - I mean, I wouldn't say musically.
- I would definitely say that they use the fact
- that they are women very much to their advantage.
- They kind of they take that-- and it's interesting,
- they've used the world's only all female brass band
- as kind of their marketing hook for-- for quite a while.
- And recently, they won the big competition in October,
- the Red Bull Street Kings thing, and they changed
- the name to Street Queens, which was really interesting.
- And they've been--they began using that.
- And the interesting thing about that is you can see like a sort of a transition.
- They picture themselves as, as women who rule the streets, in a sense,
- and in doing--in using that as like their marketing hook,
- they allow other women to kind of enter the brass
- band game because they're not the world's only all female brass band.
- If another brass band want to come in, they could--they could
- certainly do that without encroaching on the Pinettes' territory, so to speak.
- I don't know if that really answers your question,
- but just you know, they certainly--
- - [Bruce] This issue may come up in the work you're doing
- which is why I put it out there.
- Differences between second and third
- generation feminists, they differ on those issues.
- - Ethan, you wanted something?
- - [Ethan] Yeah. So I don't know if this is like--like
- in--inherent or like even obviously inherent, I don't know.
- I've just seen that.
- Well, but--I know that there are lots of--there are plenty of female,
- like horn musicians in New Orleans.
- And I was curious like, is there or have you asked
- or is there like a given reason why there is only one female brass band
- and that there haven't been-- cause I know lots of musicians go in and out of
- the Pinettes for, you know, not [inaudible], but
- sometimes based on arguments and and such but others, I know that when they came
- in, they talked about some like left, they had it
- like--they were having a kid and like raising a family.
- - Yeah. Yeah.
- So, so like, why, why
- is there only one female-- all female brass group?
- [crosstalk] Why was it? Yeah.
- - [Ethan] I mean-- These female horn players in New Orleans,
- there might have been even like a smaller or an offshoot.
- - Yeah, I mean, I think in a way we can kind of trace this back
- to the origins of brass bands and socialated pleasure clubs.
- You know, it was a means of affording respect and dignity
- in the face of the Jim Crow South, jazz funerals and that sort of thing.
- And also practically with--with it,
- you know, life insurance kind of a deal and with jazz funerals.
- But like during like the--the later 19th century,
- there was kind of this, this
- really--this big leaning on masculinity as a way to, like,
- stake your claim as like a citizen for black men in the South.
- So I think, like, there's there's kind of there's that sort of lingering history
- also that, you know, some of the streets themselves are gendered,
- but then the instruments that they're playing are gender, too.
- And that's, that's a more complicated thing, I think.
- - [Ethan] I guess I'm getting more like-- I'm curious as to
- why like the other, like female horn players
- or the horn players, for instance, that like felt they needed to claim the name
- the Pinettes, like why they haven't
- [crosstalk] like, like a-- like a rival claim.
- -Yes, yes. So the Pinettes brass band exists only legally.
- It's just a copyright thing.
- I don't know why they haven't. I mean, there aren't enough.
- I don't think that there are enough women to play.
- Well, I don't want to say that there aren't enough.
- But like in in terms of like brass band music,
- I don't think that there are enough women right now that can, you know, that can--
- - [Ethan] formulate another band. - Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Lisa?
- - [Lisa] Very superficial question
- because I don't listen to brass band music at all,
- but I couldn't help but notice their attire.
- So there's a lot of discussion
- that's just kind of about gendering and declaring it.
- It's not something just for men,
- but their attire isn't particularly feminine either.
- So I'm wondering
- if you could also almost say their de--trying to de-gender brass bands.
- - Just based on the music that they play, I don't think I could say that,
- but I think they certainly one thing that they don't do
- and they're very adamant about this is leaning on sexuality
- as a way to--to really market themselves.
- Like, you know, it's
- not like they're going to dress up in skimpy outfits or something.
- You know, they don't want to do that.
- And yeah, I don't know if that gets at--.
- Okay.
- Yeah.
- - [Bruce] In light of some of the discussion that's coming up,
- I talked to some members-- I chaired a panel in the early 2000
- with some members of the Pinettes, when they were still very much
- on the upward trajectory at the time, and some of the members were married
- to brass band musicians. [crosstalk] - Yeah, yeah.
- Careese was married to the Hot 8-- - [Bruce] And what they said is that
- they were not getting any support at home for what they were doing.
- That, in fact, you know, they were touched to sort of like intimidate them.
- And to some extent,
- I think that attitude, you know, extends beyond the family.
- So the, the question
- I would have, first of all, what happened in those marriages?
- And secondly, maybe that is indicative of why
- there's only one right now, is that it's still a difficult sell.
- What they did it was very courageous.
- And winning that Red Bull thing, I think was huge.
- And settling a lot of the humbugs, which, you know are, is the broad
- spectrum of issues and that isn't what they're doing.
- But I think that's the fact is that, you know, in the 21st century,
- there's still a lot for a woman to take on to try to pioneer
- and penetrating the all male space
- that has been the brass band world for a long time.
- So it's kind of daunting
- and their courage is apparent and the fact that there's turnover means
- there are women who want to take this on, but the fact that
- there have not been spinoff groups also says something.
- - Yeah, well, I mean,
- I think just the competitive--that's just brass band, the competitive nature.
- Like everyone's competing, you know, and and guys
- to an extent, I mean, they don't want to see the Pinettes encroach on,
- you know, sort of their territory in a sense.
- I mean, the Pinettes don't really care who--
- you look like you're something to say.
- - [audience member] I think in the context of why they're aren't more women
- and what happened in those marriages is in
- some of that lack of support and [inaudible] within the black community
- and for many men being musicians is alternative to [inaudible]
- fairly flexible employment [inaudible].
- Women are overwhelmingly better educated.
- More likely to hold down jobs that provide a steady paycheck.
- And giving up that in the format of family
- in a family economy is a significant loss.
- Musicians make 17.8 a year on average.
- A lot of the brass band guys aren't making that.
- They're not eating regularly and they're offsetting it by
- working in the service industry or working with the trades
- that's not as open.
- - 1,780 a year?
- -[audience memeber] 17,800 dollars per year.
- -Okay, that makes more sense.
- - [Bruce] To get back to my question though, you know,
- was what I was getting at was, you know,
- what the result of the sort of interfamily issues related.
- Did people withdraw from the band as a result of the difficulty
- they were experiencing within the family?
- - Yeah. I mean, I'm not entirely sure
- I know that the--the members that were married, well,
- I think are still married to--to other brass band,
- you know, people like in the Hot 8, Careese, one of the former trumpet
- players used to--were--was--is still is married to one of the guys in the Hot 8.
- But I mean, I don't know what happened to that thing.
- I don't know what exactly [crosstalk] - [Bruce] the way to deal with it.
- - Yeah. Yeah.
- I'm not entirely sure I'd have to look into that.
- Anyone else, questions?
- Okay. Cool. There are cookies up front that I made
- if you'd like to eat some and some grapes and stuff.