Uniformity

Marin Alsop, music director of the Baltimore Symphony, has commissioned students at New York’s Parsons The New School for Design to craft new outfits for orchestral musicians, in a probably overdue effort to retire the white-tie-and-tails/black gown dress code that has been the symphony night standard since the 19th century, The Baltimore Sun’s Tim Smith reports:

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/classicalmusic/2012/09/marin_alsop_bso_launch_pilot_p.html

I’ve long advocated black or some other dark-colored shirts and trousers for men and pants-suits for women, loose-fitting in the neck and upper body to accommodate the contortions that string musicians, trombonists, et al., go through when playing.

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Meanwhile, a Farmington, NM, middle school has told an 11-year-old orchestra student that she may not play her purple violin because it doesn’t look like all the other fiddles. John M. Glionna reports in the Los Angeles Times:

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-school-purple-violin-20120912,0,6370815.story