It is a well-known fact throughout the choral community that men are beginning to become spots of blue in a sea of pink, or the minority compared to the many women in most choirs. Men just don’t seem to be in the running anymore, and choirs of the 21st century are beginning to suffer. Choral directors are nervous, watching as the once-steady flow of men diminishes into a rather slow drip. This is obviously a major problem, but will time be able to untie this nasty knot, or will it just grow bigger and bigger?

Male choristers like this young man are becoming a scarce commodity in the 21st century.

No one really knows when this problem occurred or why, but as society began to take a dip for the worse, choirs began to develop testosterone deficiencies. This paralleled-similarity between society’s change and that of most choirs is no coincidence. Somewhere between the early twentieth century and now, a change has occurred, and it has indeed caused the fluctuation in society that is responsible for the male ‘mass extinction’ in choirs.

A Californian surfs . . . a blond girl is unintelligent . . . a ballerina is anorexic . . . and a guy in a choir is gay. These are all stereotypes that have developed over the last century, but as one could probably tell, they are absolutely not true. However the fact that they are not true does not suggest that they are not hurtful. Actually, they are very hurtful, and the fact that society plays off of them so much is absolutely shameful.  That just goes to show how low our society has finally stooped. To take a harmless activity like being in a choir, and use the media to spread negative feelings about it is absolutely disgusting. Even worse, people are so brainwashed by the same stereotype over and over again, that people are actually beginning to believe them, and men are discouraged from entering a choir, which is causing the choir gender ratio to change.

I am not sure where the stereotype about choirs came from, but I can guess that it represents the media’s perfect ‘macho’ image of males. Any popular movie, today, will show a child going to a sports practice. Very rarely does a child ever go to a choir rehearsal. This is because society expects a male to want to play a sport over singing, and the media enforces this. Thus the stereotype about choirs is born. If it is not considered a worthy male activity by the media, it is all of a sudden considered a female opportunity; therefore any male who joins a choir is considered to be feminine or gay.

Now, I am certainly not trying to throw any bad feelings or prejudice toward the homosexual community. What society is beginning to turn into is a bad thing; however it is not going to change simply because what it is doing is wrong. It is the people living under society that have to change. In other words, if a child is being made fun of for being in a choir, instead of sulking he could look on the bright side. Firstly, if that child is truly gifted at music and wants to continue singing, his odds are greater than that of a woman’s when it comes to passing auditions for things. Secondly, if that child is worried about people thinking he is gay, all he has to do is tell the people making fun of him that he is in the choir of all girls. I don’t know of too many junior high or high school guys that would not want to be in a room of all women. If a child is secure enough in himself to be able to look at his glass half full instead of half empty, then the taunting of society should not matter. Now then, the question arises: What if a child is not secure enough to handle the conditions which being in a choir involves? Should the child quit choir? My personal answer is "No", because to me the lessons one might learn in choir are priceless. One learns teamwork, discipline and how to make music. To me the ability to make music is far more cherished than an old football trophy; however the answer to my question lies with each person who reads it. It is their decision, and I am not going to tell someone to choose one way or the other, but I am sure a secureness in oneself helps to answer the question.

Statistics show that more than half of all homeschoolers are involved in some kind of music. I take this to be a direct correlation to the fact that homeschoolers are more secure in themselves than most public school children. They are raised by their families, and more than often they are not subjected to society -- which is at the base of most of the problems today. They almost always have very intelligent parents, because their parents are their teachers, and have a good sense of who they are. They are able to cope with the world easier than publicly-schooled children because they have a strong base upon which they can build. In short, it seems that with our current society homeschooling is the way to raise a child, even if the parent is not a good teacher. This sounds strange but it is true. Even if the child is not learning anything, it is learning how to adapt to the fast-moving world in which we live.

When the idea of a choir was first invented in ancient Greece, it was composed of all men. I find it baffling that now it seems that the tables have been turned. Women now hold the majority spot in choirs, and because of this, most SATB choirs are unable to hold up a quality sound. Without men to balance the treble sound provided by women, the choir falls on its face. The beautiful Choral pieces written for choirs a century ago are going out of style, not because the music is becoming dull or boring, but because today’s choirs, can not hold them up.