Tuba players in orchestra's around the world are usually men, but that's starting to change. The Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra has appointed a woman to its principal tuba position for the first time. And the orchestra says it's starting to see more women auditioning for instrument positions traditionally held by men.
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00:00Weighing in at more than 10 kilos, the tuba is the largest member of the brass family.
00:13When Rachel Kelly was asked to choose an instrument to learn in grade 5, the tuba wasn't her first
00:19choice.
00:20She was initially drawn to the flute or clarinet.
00:23I'd seen all the other girls play the flute in the school band and stuff, so I thought
00:27that seemed like a reasonable choice.
00:30Couldn't make any sounds on those instruments when I came down to it, and apparently made
00:34a really good sound on the tuba, so that's where I ended up.
00:43The 25-year-old Queenslander has been appointed the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra's principal
00:48tuba player.
00:50She was chosen through a blind audition process to weed out any bias.
00:54A candidate will enter the room, they won't be wearing shoes, so the panel won't necessarily
00:59know anything about them other than the sound that they hear, so there they're listening
01:03for their intonation and their musicality and the personality that they bring to the
01:08music.
01:09The TSO's principal tuba role has never been held by a woman, until now.
01:14A study of orchestras worldwide found 90% of tuba players are male, and 83% of principal
01:21musician positions are held by men.
01:23But that's slowly changing.
01:26It's much more common now to see women auditioning for low brass and for double bass, or timpani.
01:32Those sorts of positions have typically been occupied by men because they require a lot
01:37of physicality, so I think it's been a very gradual process, but it's that whole thing,
01:41if you can't be what you can't see.
01:43I think that there's a lot of ideas out there, like super old-fashioned ideas from years
01:48gone by of people, you know, it's not very ladylike, or they think there's a lot of
01:54strength or something that you need to play the instrument that maybe women don't have
01:58or something like that, but it's just so far from being true.
02:01Breaking down stereotypes, one note at a time.