No shoes, no shirt? No problem. NOT.

I just completed service on a faculty task force for setting standards for students’ performance attire. I HATE being old enough to talk about how times have changed, but MY, how times have changed!

Private dress gets more public with each succeeding generation. I’m seeing more skin on the ladies and more rags on the guys. I’m seeing more sandals in wintertime (it’s cold out there, people!) and fewer shoes at all in the summertime. I’m seeing tighter clothes on not-so-tight bodies, and I’ve seen quite enough underwear waistbands and trouser cleavage to last the rest of my life. Skirts are getting shorter, and young ladies continually pull them down to compensate. Guys are dressed like they’ve been working at the transmission shop all day. And many people have hair pointing in more directions than Lady Liberty’s crown. [I believe people actually spend money to look that way, whereas I could just climb out of bed in the morning and look that way for free.]

Concert dress has taken a similar dive, and not just in the audience. Performers look increasingly like they’ve just walked in from or are headed to the nightclub. Solo instrumentalists with mid-thigh skirts, no hose, and sandals. Orchestra musicians with skintight pants, blouses hanging out, and sandals.

A two-part rule of thumb to consider: 1) If your audience is cruising your skin, it’s distracting them from the music. 2) If your audience is horrified by your skin, it’s distracting them from the music. If the music is not being served, then we’re off the mark. We owe our composers better than that.

Perhaps choral ensembles represent the greatest possibilities for wardrobe distraction. Chorus members stand, and we can see them from head to toe, whereas orchestra members are seated and hiding behind music stands and each other. This is also true for church choirs, especially those that process up and down aisles. The directors’ rules I have encountered tend to favor flat black shoes, no large earrings, and tamed hair for church choirs.

Mr. Arthur Buckley, choral director at St. Agnes Academy, Houston, knew just what to say to young people who tended to mistake the concert stage for a speed-dating arena. I have taken his ideas and embellished them with my own to develop my official dress code for my chorus:

Visual uniformity on stage is vital to our effectiveness as an ensemble. This dress code policy is in place to avoid disrespecting 1) your colleagues who are trying to look good, and 2) the audience whose attention is diverted from the music when someone’s appearance sticks out. If you are deemed unfit to be seen on stage for the concert, you will be sent away with a grade penalty.

EVERYONE
-- NO cologne. LOTS of deodorant.
-- No dangling or flashy earrings. Small studs OK.
-- Hair out of eyes and off of shoulders.

WOMEN
-- Long-sleeved, solid white, dressy blouse. No sweaters. No knit tops. No off-white. No yellow. WHITE. No open gaps between buttons. Cottons must be ironed. No cleavage. No bare hips. No bare midriff. No navel. Cover everything except face and hands.
-- Ankle-length, solid black skirt or dress pants. No jeans. No tights. No dark blue. No gray. No pinstripes. BLACK. No form-fitting. No hip huggers.
-- Concerning the area of your body where the blouse meets the skirt/pants: Tailored hemlines are acceptable but must be low enough to keep skin covered when arms are raised to hold music. No hemline may drop below the hip joint. If it’s lower than the hip joint, it will have to be tucked in. If it’s otherwise sloppy looking at a distance, it must be tucked in.
-- Black, closed-toe dress shoes. No bare toes. No sandals. No flip-flops. No boots. No sneakers. No dark blue. No gray. BLACK. High heels not recommended.
-- Pearls OK. Nothing shiny or flashy.

MEN
-- Solid black suit or tux. No pinstripes. No dark gray. No navy blue. BLACK
-- Solid white formal or dress shirt. No off-white. No yellow. No patterns. WHITE.
-- Black bow tie. No stud in place of the tie. No long ties. No bolas. No patterns. SOLID.
-- Black socks. No white. No argyle. No skin. BLACK.
-- Black dress shoes. No sandals. No boots. No sneakers. No dark blue. No gray. BLACK.

Sounds awfully detailed doesn’t it! Almost to the point of insulting. But despite all that, I’ve had only ONE concert with NO “wardrobe malfunctions.” Choral singing is a dictatorship, and the conductor is the dictator. I tell my chorus, “I want you to look beautiful on stage. And I will define what is beautiful.”

And so forth. There are as many wardrobe policies as there are conductors, I suppose. But the constant is that it is not about us or our audiences as much as it is about the composers, whose names will be remembered long after our outlandish wardrobes are forgotten. Set rules and don’t apologize; it’s more important than ever these days.