Gender balance at festivals

[MrGongGong]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/mar/07/the-guardian-view-on-diversity-in-classical-music-quality-and-equality#

[Ein Heldenleben]

A relative of mine is doing a postgraduate composition degree at a leading London music college . Every other composer on the course is male . The overwhelming majority of those taking the composition option on his undergrad degree were male. Both these academic organisations make enormous efforts in terms of diversity yet despite this composition seems to be a male option . I honestly don't think it is prejudice that is deterring female classical composers these days - you only have to look at the success of women in the pop field .

[french frank]

I honestly don't think it is prejudice that is deterring female classical composers these days - you only have to look at the success of women in the pop field .

Taking that in the same context - composition - rather than performance at festivals, it's still an extraordinary imbalance for which an explanation would be useful. Looking at the UK A-level results for 2016 (bar charts, not exact percentages), Music is one of several subjects where the male/female split is somewhere between 40% and 60%, with Geography and Chemistry about equal, somewhat more women choosing History, somewhat more men choosing Music and Political Studies. This contrasts with an overwhelming (90%+) women who chose Performing/Expressive Arts and an overwhelming majority of men (90%+) who chose Computing in 2016).

It might* suggest that women are more drawn to performance and men to creation, but it terms of jazz festivals it would only highlight the relative shortage of women, wouldn't it?

*I say "might" very tentatively because there are highly likely to be other factors in play than simple gender.