PEORIA MAGAZINE October 2022

NEGATIVE MESSAGES SarahMarie Dillard has been playing the local music scene since she was a teenager. She started out awed, naïve and just happy to be there. Now in her early 30s, Dillard is a full-time working musician and a tireless advocate for music and the arts, for the Peoria area as a great place to live and work, and for truth, justice and a better way – especially for marginalized people. “When you arrive in the music industry as a woman, you find it’s a bit of a club and you’re not invited to be a full member,” Dillard said. “Even if that message is unintentional or subliminal, we’re receiving it. Knowing you’re not invited can be enough tomake youwant to stay home.” So, many women do. Kindall Reuschel, founder of the Peoria Music Live page, scoffs at the notion that men dominate the musical talent pool. “There are tons of women with talent who can play, but they’re just playing and singing at home,” Reuschel said. “They have other priorities. A lot of the reason more women aren’t out gigging has to do with families they have to take care of. They don’t have the same opportunities to get out.” Reuschel knows priorities. Ten years ago, she was a homeless single mother. Desperation drove her to clean houses to earn food money. Eventually, she turned that into a thriving business, Hire A Housewife. Now remarried to a musician, Reuschel started the PML Facebook page five years ago. It has grown to more than 16,000 followers.

“I never really considered myself a feminist. I felt like people were too sensitive,” Reuschel said. “But when I started Peoria Music Live and then put my face out there, that changed. I started to feel the undertones in what people say. “I’m not a performer, but just from the business side, I’ve been told, ‘How do you take care of your kids when you’re in a bar five nights a week?’ I can explain ‘til I’m blue in the face that I’m not drinking, this is work … “I can’t imagine looking at a guy and saying, ‘You shouldn’t be out in a bar three nights a week,’ regardless of the reason. But this is what happens to women.” It takes practice to sharpen your instrumental and vocal skills, to build the confidence to perform in public. That’s true for men and women alike. But history and embedded social norms loom differently over women. “Over a lifetime, that message is loud and clear,” Dillard said. “You can’t put it on one day, one venue, one stage. But women are not stupid … When you see that pattern over a lifetime, you do receive that message, whether it says you’re not allowed or you’re not good enough. “If you’re not given the chance to get that stage time to build your career, even if you’ve earned it, that means you have to stay in that day job where you’re making 78 cents for every dollar a man is making, meaning you’re not going to be able to save as fast to buy your instruments or invest in your music career. Everything accumulates into a very stunted system – which is easy

then to say no one is to blame for it. But that doesn’t mean it’s not real or it’s not harming anyone.” UNIQUE CHALLENGES Female musicians are treated differ ently than their male colleagues. Those interviewed for this story didn’t want to get too specific on the record. Nobody wants a career-killing reputation. But they know what they know and see what they see. One challenge is physical appearance. It’s not uncommon to see guys on stage wearing ratty tees and hair a mess, like they just rolled out of bed with a hangover. “But if a female musician walks in the door, the first thing a lot of venue owners do is judge whether she’s attractive enough to play there,” said Jerry Kolb, a local promoter and vocal advocate for female artists. “As a female, I am acutely aware of how much looks matter,” said Janet Bantz Glavin, lead singer for the trio Goodnight Gracie. “As an aging female” – she’s in her 50s – “I really feel that. I think there’s some pressure to be sexy, as opposed to a talented musician. You hope the quality of music is what sells, but with some venues, you get the feeling that they’re wondering if this is a woman whose looks can get people to come out.” Sydney Meuth, lead singer for The Grey Governors, got her first lessons in appearance from her mother, a professional opera singer. “Therewas such huge pressure on how she looked. Huge,” Meuth said. “How

Victoria Allen sings and dances at Fiesta del Sol at the Peoria Riverfront

Rosemary Ardner plays violin for Strat and Strad at Obed and Isaac’s Microbrewery and Eatery in Peoria

OCTOBER 2022 PEORIA MAGAZINE 79