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Baitz, Dana. 2018. "Toward a Trans* Method in Musicology." In The Oxford handbook of Music
and Queerness, by Sheila Whiteley (eds) Fred Everett Mauss, 366-381. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.

An attempt to examine the differences between trans* and queer subjectivities, specifically in music.
Where the two differ and where they overlap. The key point being the queer transcendence of sexuality
gender and hegemony, and transsexual investment into those same constructs. Looking at queer music
we see emphasis on subversion and deconstruction: lyrics that forgo constant gender, androgynous
presentation of performers or music styles the defy categorisation. Yet music by some trans artists
eludes that methodology. When queerness is only present through the subversive crossing of gender is
the music still queer or not, starting instead from a trans methodology can we not better understand the
complex phenomenology in action during a performance by a trans musician. As Baitz this simplification
only really applies fully to transsexuals and leaves out the nuance and queerness of more transcendent
non-binary (or even binary) trans people. The introduction of a complex phenomological and “new
materialist” argument when including nonbinary identities shows how only considering binary transsexual
perspectives can limit and simplify a situation because it’s just “easier” to leave it at that. This is a trap
that lots of binary transsexuals (especially racialised) can fall into as we blindly miss our own privileges
even as incredibly marginalised individuals.

Bartolome, Sarah J. 2016. "Melanie's Story: A Narrative Account of a Transgender Music

Educator's Journey." Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education(Issue 207-208) 25-
47.

A narrative account of music education, transgenderism and the roll the former has to the later. The cis-
hetero perspective is painfully evident; the standard metanarrative of becoming trans and “changing”
your sex persists as an apparently important point to discuss. We see the stories of childhood
pain/coming out/crossdressing that that transwomen are so often reduced to in the eyes of cis-gendered
people. The privileging of the Cis-perspective is incredibly obvious. The music account is one that
resonates personally with me, the love of the choir from a young age due to being a “boy” soprano, the
increasing dissolution with choirs as gender starts to cement into a painful friction of internalities and
externalities, and finally the choice of musical path as a result of gender. The stories of workplace
discrimination and having to change where one would want to work both role and location wise are
important aspects of the relationship with music, highlighting the cis-phallogocentric nature of Music as
an industry; though the intense personal relationship that “Melanie" has with music shows how that is
only the social industry not music itself. Rather than a relationship with music this account is more a
relationship between cis and trans subjects and how navigating that as a trans-person is full of anxieties
that the cis-people around them can’t fully emphasise with.

Bartolome , Sarah J. & Stanford, Melanie E. 2017. ""Can't I sing with the girls?" A Transgender
Music Educator's Journey." In Maginalized Voices in Music Education, by Brent C. Talbot, 114-
136. Milton: Taylor & Francis Group.
An interesting revisit to the earlier article on Melanie’s experience in music education as a transwoman.
With a two-year gap between the article and this chapter it’s interesting to see the growth both in the
style and language used and the narrative itself. The move away from a sterile academic language to a
more conversational and casual tone takes out the frictious perspective that pervaded the first article.
This perspective would come from a combination of presumably unintentional cissexist gender
entitlement and the dissective relationship between the impersonal academic voice and the personal
trans account. This chapter emphasises the subtle ways in which prejudice affects trans lives, the
constant anxiety at being clocked, financial fears in transition costs but also in pay and the ways
authority that might otherwise be “functional” falls apart for trans people in ways that are invisible to their
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cis counterparts whose relationship with those same authorities. We see in some of the stories that the
issues and prejudices exist not with people but with the systems they operate in. The more fact that
there’s such a notable tonal shift over the course of 2 years and that Bartolome had already known
Melanie for nearly 5 years at that original shows the difficulty of adapting language to be more trans
friendly when coming from a cis-perspective.

Cusick, Suzanne G. 2012. "On a Lesbian Relationship with Music." In Music and Identity Politics,
by Ian Biddle, 19-35. London: Routledge.

A recognition of difference and with difference, Cusick investigates what would constitute a uniquely
lesbian relationship with music, a question that she and other lesbian musical colleagues realised they’d
left unanswered. By examining various definitions of sexuality and “lesbian” she arrives on an
examination of power and position within her music. The converse connection between how she teaches
and learns to love music, the similarity between embodied aspects of music and her lesbian sex, or the
fluidity of any act of music or lesbian love. Cusick believes that within all the ways her relationship with
music is filled with love that love is – for her - a lesbian love. That I think is the start of a contention with
this line of thought and another line of thought. This essay is in no doubt a personal account, she casts
no aspersions about the nature of sexuality, lesbianism or music and as such this is less: on a lesbian
relationship with music, and more on Cusick’s relationship with music. The line of thought here is
nonetheless fascinating, music is hegemonic culture, yet queerness isn’t hegemonic identity or culture
that friction must exist in some form. Thus, this reconciliation of selves must be undertaken, but due to its
marginalised frame awareness for its existence as a quandary is non-existent.

Dibben, Nicola. 2002. "Gender Identity and Music." In Musical Identities, by David Hargreaves
and Dorothy Miell Raymond Macdonald, 117-133. Oxford: Oxford university press.
An investigation of the various forms of gender identity formation within musical sphere that the at the
time recent literature had been exploring. From the more empirical quantitative studies surveying the
musical tastes of young adolescents across gendered lines to more subjective and positional ways in
which works create a gendered position or gaze. The literature review aspect of the chapter offers many
really good critiques of these studies: the erasure of the effects of other aspects of identity such as race
and socio-economic status, or the over privileging of works as “works” rather than as more holistic ways
of musicking. The conclusion of a positive correlation between music and the formation of gender identity
has many interesting potential avenues when considering the interactions with a transgender identity.
Specifically, interesting to me is the formation of in and out groups through musical taste and the
gendered associations those gendered groups give their musical preferences and how that aligns with
my personal experience of feeling using music to pretend to “perform” hetero-masculinity and how I felt
that I needed to hide my actual musical tastes because of effeminania. The concluding sentence
affirming music’s capacity to afford gender exploration and expressions though nodding to more gender
deconstructivist cis individuals feels like it speaks directly to a trans reader.
Moore, J. L. 2008. "The impact of participation in school choirs on the consrtuction of gender
identity: An autobiographical narrative." GEMS (Gender, Education, Music, & Society), 4. 1-17.

Moore engages in an autobiographical account of her musical journey to examine how gender was
experienced. The constant awareness of gender while being a woman trombonist, the masculine
language around being strong and powerful, both musically and literally in needing to carry the large low
brass instruments. Unlike that, choir was Butler’s “stylized repetition of acts”. Unlike brass band the rarity
of boys in choirs due to gender rolls leads to them being privileged and favoured, further reinforcing
gender rolls by showing the male preference. Gender came up even more as a student teacher out of
college, because of choir being “feminine” the boys in it reacted to assert “extreme dominance towards
me” A similar narrative exploration to what I’m aiming for. However, the use of a rather bio-essentialist
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reading of it leaves a lot of the gender discussion with a rather essentialist tone that is most obvious
through the Beauvoir/Irigaray-esque view of femaleness as lack of maleness and putting on or
“becoming” a man to do authority, this leaves it feeling rather frictious. The investigation of a relationship
between gender and music here focuses more on music than gender due to the “fixed” cis gender taking
this frame and adding in a fluid trans gender will broaden the possible relationships between music and
gender

Nichols, Jeananne. 2013. "Rie's Story, Ryan's Jounrey: Music in the Life of a Transgender
Student." Journal or Research in Music Education 61, no. 3 262-279.

An external cis perspective on a trans-student’s relationship with music and music education during an
already confusing period in life that in this especially harrowing personal story shows how it can be a
lifeline. We see music education’s roll in crating safe environments for both musical and personal/gender
expression. Through Rie’s story we see how music can be a form of safety in many ways and how it
serves to temporarily absolve and/or placate queer precarity. Despite Nichols awareness of the harmful
metanarratives (especially around coming of age and high school ones) and the essentialising of trans
and LGB experiences we see nonetheless those issues being recreated. The account is concerned little
with the roll of music in Rie’s trans and more general gender experience and more the broader queering
presence that she had in the school environment. Rie could have any other queer identity and still have
a similar narrative as the one presented here the fact that this paper misses those questions is a shame.
Also, by focusing so much on how music education helped contrast the violence Rie experienced the
account assumes the normal hegemonic education can’t also be a form of violence to queer students.
Queering music is not just about being nice to queer people but also reframing relationships of power
within the discourse.

Powell, Sarah J. 2014. "Masculinity and choral singing: An Australian perspective." International
Jounral of Music Education vol. 33, no. 2 233-243.

An interview-based study of males and choir, covering four different choirs with different ages and
expectations. The perception of choir as being girly was shared among all choirs even though they
disagreed with the assumption in various ways. It is placed in contrast and opposition to sport as being
less masculine. the older choirs show more “stereotypical” gendered behaviours showing how the
assimilation into hegemonic gender takes time to be enforced. The focus on only male choirs obscures
one of the main points of conflict: interactions across the gender boundary, those interactions are never
predicable and are an important aspect the discussion. The paper also seems to accept these
stereotypes, suggesting finding ways for choirs to be seen as facilitating them rather than being opposed
to them, with only a small nod to deconstruction at the end. A good depiction of the ways gender is
enforced in high school choir and music the sense of victory and achievement being a bass and “pity”
towards the trebles is familiar though through a trans lens of hyper-performativity and gender envy. The
point about creating an alternate masculinity has an interesting trans reading to consider.

Publius, Xavia A. 2015. "Suggestions for transgender inclusion in classical music: a mini cycle."
Dissertations and Theses @ UNI. 269 1-73.

An examination of ways to create a transgender style of music through a variety of methods. The story of
transness and music is one that resonates, the relationship with vocal registers and voice parts as a
trans-person, the sense of loss as your voice, once a vehicle of gender euphoria, cracks and imprisons
you in a foreign body, and/or the general hostility within cis spaces for gender transgression. The
following bill of rights while decidedly American in its triteness highlights the ways that music is foreign to
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trans bodies and the pain that we shouldn’t have to deal with as musicians. By focusing on creating
transgender music in abstract and in practice, the personal question that I’m trying to ask is moved past,
instead trying to create something new that doesn’t have such a toxic past relationship. This is the
closest I’ve been able to find to what I want to do. The thesis has a weird tone due to its very
prescriptivist assertions that clash with something as personal as a transgender music. It’s interesting to
see the approach a composer has taken in what appears to be a similar starting idea as mine, though
from a more external point rather than an internal one.

Silveira, Jason M. 2019. "Perpsectives of a Transgender Music Education Student." Journal of

Reseach in Music Education vol. 66 is. 4 428-448.

Another music education researcher examining trans issues and how to approach them. The issues with
an external cisgender summary of a trans account are evident with the focus of some inquiries and the
framing in the introduction designed to explain things that are intuitive to a trans-person but are noted
here with apparent shock. The first 5 findings from the interview are a change in relationship between
two things over the course of the transition, which creates for me a really compelling framing for the
discussion. This evolving relationship between two things during transition is exactly what I’d like explore
and while this doesn’t specifically address what I hope to, it addresses its own points better than any of
the other stricter narrative approaches. How relatable the experience from transfemme to transmasc is
intrigues me. Outside of the issues around binders and performing, and assuming male privilege, the
corollaries between his account and mine show how a majority of this friction comes from cis-societies
inability to accept trans identities regardless of individual genders rather than the transmisogny I
assumed. The issues I’d chalked up to a move away from privileges through transition are separate from
that. The music education perspective is also present throughout the article leaving the trans accounts
even staler than they already are in their second-hand state.

 
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