Why is sexism still tolerated in our industry? We need an immediate and total change in attitudes across the boardFollow James Rhodes on twitter @JRhodesPianist

Classical music is not dying (pace yet another overly-enthusiastic report at Slate.com) but there are clearly many problems in the industry.

Most of them are brought on by those of us in the business itself, be it the musicians (who are for the most part precious, egocentric, grandiose and socially stunted), the gatekeepers (narcissistic, obtuse, living in the past, as resistant to change as they are entrenched in their cliques) or the record labels (risk-averse and budget-deprived, relying on their back catalogue as a life raft).

There are fixes on the way, albeit not immediate ones, but in the meantime, shining a light on the grubby areas that should make those involved slink away in shame cannot be a bad thing. And, at the very top of that list, above the budget cuts, extortionate big-name fees, mafia-like factions eroding anything resembling real-world accessibility and inclusion, is the sexism. It is everywhere. Radio 4's Today Programme on Monday invited Jude Kelly, artistic director of the Southbank Centre, and the composer and conductor Debbie Wiseman to discuss the acute gender imbalance among conductors, particularly. (Listen to it here, available until 9 February.)

It's a problem that was highlighted last summer when Marin Alsop became the first woman to conduct the last night of the Proms in its nearly-120-year history, prompting headlines and snide comments both in public and in private. Vasily Petrenko, an award-winning, aggressively talented young conductor talked on record about how women conductors are a "sexual distraction" for the orchestra.

Or try this: "The essence of a politician's profession is strength. The essence of a woman is weakness."

Had any politician in this country (UKIP aside) gone on record with such a statement, he would be out of politics faster than a rat out of an aqueduct. And yet when Yuri Temirkanov, one of Russia's most eminent conductors, said this, substituting the word "conductor" for "politician", barely an eyebrow was raised. It is expected, lazy, swaggering and rife, and the stories of everyday sexism from orchestral members could fill libraries many times over.

Many orchestras, especially in the US, are now auditioning blind, with participants playing behind screens, and there has been an exponential increase in women being hired as a result – one study shows the likelihood of progressing beyond the preliminary round increases by 50% for women in these kinds of auditions. Now orchestras need to improve their childcare support and eradicate the patriarchal legacy inspired by the likes of the Vienna and Berlin Philharmonics in order to make things gel.

Good looks have long helped to compensate for a lack of talent across the entire music industry. But the sexualised marketing of young women, particularly, in classical music has also now become normalised. Witness (the undoubtedly hugely talented) Yuja Wang's barefoot performances complete with interval dress changes, see the hundreds of PR shots of the kind that keep teenage boys locked in their bedrooms for everyone from Hélène Grimaud to Alison Balsom. Some album cover portraits for female artists could double as escort agency profile pics. Publicity for young male artists is increasingly sexualised too, but not to anything like the same degree.

Sex and beauty aside, when women have to cope not just with a society that places physical attractiveness ahead of everything else but also with an industry that has an ingrained sense of entitled chauvinism, there is cause for alarm and shame in equal measure.

We've seen it in sports (witness the recent horrific Twitter Q&A with Olympic gymnast Beth Tweddle). What we need to see in classical music, also, is an immutable, instant and resolute change in attitude from the top down. Figureheads such as Jude Kelly are making huge strides but the frustration at having to spend her time focusing on something that shouldn't even exist is palpable.

Listen to Argerich nailing Rachmaninov's third concerto or Marin Alsop flinging Brahms' second symphony out to a shell-shocked audience and I dare you even to attempt to justify the shabby, second-class treatment to which female musicians are exposed.

More blogs by James Rhodes



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Follow James Rhodes on twitter @JRhodesPianist