ABSTRACT
Western classical music leaders should consider how identity threat and the constant perception of marginalization and assault undermines students’ belief in themselves and contributes to academic and musical underperformance. The Eurocentrism of the curriculum, musical programming, and aesthetic environment directly contribute to this marginalization and the concomitant erosion of self-worth among these students. But for many Black and Latinx musicians, as in other fields, the trade-off for high-level participation in a highly competitive and mostly white field has been to acculturate into a system that devalues nonwhite cultures. Arguments justifying the preservation of the contemporary conservatory environment map onto strategies that protect the white racial frame: minimization, assumption of white moral virtue, and normalization. The restrictions on teachers and students evident in Western classical music pedagogy, in the working relationships between conductors, soloists and orchestra members, management and ensembles, boards and leadership, arise from the fact that the power relations of classical music are deeply conservative.
