{"id":17197,"date":"2026-08-06T10:06:47","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T14:06:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oc.ca\/?p=17197"},"modified":"2026-08-06T10:12:38","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T14:12:38","slug":"who-gets-to-be-a-musician","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oc.ca\/en\/who-gets-to-be-a-musician\/","title":{"rendered":"Who Gets to Be a Musician? : Rising costs, the mental health crisis, and the future of orchestral careers in Canada in the age of AI"},"content":{"rendered":"

A teacher tells a room full of young musicians: if\u00a0you’re\u00a0serious about an orchestral career, you need “x.” “X” could be\u00a0almost anything;\u00a0a better instrument, a specific piece of equipment,\u00a0or\u00a0an\u00a0incredible\u00a0opportunity.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

A student who has “x” turns to the student beside them, who doesn’t, and asks, without malice, “why don’t you have ‘x’?” The answer: “I can’t afford it.” A brief, awkward silence follows. Then we move on.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This exact exchange played out at a masterclass I recently attended.\u00a0The same frustrations around finances came up later, when the topic turned to auditions, and the advice was: take as many as you can. Afterward, talking with peers, the consensus\u00a0was\u00a0resigned. “In an ideal world, sure, but how am I supposed to afford to travel to auditions multiple times a year?”<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ve heard versions of this conversation constantly since I started my university education. Ironically, these conversations happen in universities and summer music programs, spaces where you already need a level of financial privilege to participate. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Increasingly, I hear from young musicians who feel the barriers to an orchestral career, during and after all that education, are only getting higher. What frustrates them most\u00a0isn’t\u00a0only the\u00a0cost, but also that professors, instructors, and administrators do not seem to understand the precarity of their situation.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I’ve dealt with some of these frustrations myself. Institutions and teachers are well-meaning, but they haven’t grappled with the fact that, since the pandemic, the barriers between young musicians and the careers they’re training for have only grown. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Here’s what I’ve come to believe, and what I wish someone had told me earlier: the people who see the most success in reaching an orchestral career are increasingly the people with the most financial privilege \u2014 not necessarily the most talent, or the most\u00a0hard-core\u00a0work ethic.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I want to spend the rest of this post doing two things: laying out what these barriers\u00a0actually look\u00a0like, and how\u00a0they’ve\u00a0worsened in recent years, compounding an existing mental health crisis among Canadian musicians; and then looking ahead with more optimism. There’s a cultural shift underway among the youth of my generation,\u00a0a growing recognition, after growing up around technology, that the human experience should be defined by in-person connection, by doing things ourselves, and by using our own minds rather than outsourcing our decisions to artificial intelligence.\u00a0I think young musicians\u00a0are well positioned to take advantage of this shift, and to help reshape our cultural institutions around it.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The Post-Secondary Education Funding Crisis<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

If you have attended a university music program in music performance in Canada in the past few years, you are\u00a0most likely aware\u00a0that these\u00a0programs and the institutions where they are offered\u00a0are in crisis.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Public post-secondary institutions in particular are struggling since the federal government capped international student numbers.\u00a0These students had been a major source of university funding, largely because of the higher tuition rates they paid. They also became a convenient scapegoat for the housing shortage \u2014 a narrative I\u00a0don’t\u00a0think holds up well under scrutiny, but one that stuck regardless, and helped justify the cap.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Because of this, and despite provincial caps, tuition rates\u00a0for domestic students\u00a0have risen, despite an overwhelming number of students disagreeing with proposed increases.\u00a0<\/span>In 2023, for example, the University of British-Columbia’s tuition consultation survey showed that 92% of students rejected a tuition increase.<\/span><\/a>\u00a0The increase went ahead anyway, and\u00a0<\/span>UBC has since stopped sending out a tuition consultation survey.<\/span><\/a>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Some programs have weathered this better than others. Music programs are not among them. In a private conversation with a dean a few years ago, I was told something that’s stuck with me since: music programs are some of the most expensive programs to run per student, while the research output, career outcomes, and broader societal “impact” they produce are, by the university’s usual metrics, small.\u00a0That’s\u00a0one\u00a0dean’s\u00a0framing, not a fact I can prove \u2014 but it matched everything I was already sensing, and it says a lot about a system that has long undervalued the place of art in our lives. Music programs get cut first because\u00a0they’re\u00a0seen as the least essential.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The response varies by institution, but in conversations with music students across Canada, a clear pattern is emerging: services that used to be free have been reduced, cut entirely, or turned into things you now must pay for. This runs the gamut, from access to performance spaces for rehearsals, to collaborative pianist funds, recital recordings, and the number of private lesson hours you’re allotted<\/span>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

On the surface, these shifts can look minor, but in practice, they stack into a real barrier to full participation. Here’s an example of what this might look like in dollars, if you’re a student at one of these universities applying to a summer program:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n