I never saw this installation—I merely saw photos on the Internet.

"Every year, Emergency INDEX invites authors to document performances they made in the previous year. By including performances regardless of their country of origin, their genre, aims, or popularity, INDEX reveals a breathtaking variety of practices used in performance work as it actually exists today. For readers, INDEX offers a cutting edge view of performance as it is used in dance, theater, music, visual art, political activism, scientific research, poetry, advertising, terrorism, and other disciplines. For artists, INDEX provides an opportunity to document the most important aspects of new work, without the need for spin or salesmanship. For anyone interested in contemporary performance, INDEX is required reading. INDEX 2011 includes 249 performances and a comprehensive index of key terms used to describe them."

• There were over 170 applicants for this job posting. (Yes, I gathered that from the text of the rejection letter, but I saw the list: it was long.)
• I recognized a few names. Many have just received their final degree. Others are ABD, and some are almost ABD like me.
• We are applying from all over the country.
• There are also a few Ivy Leaguers on this list. I saw a handful from Harvard (actually, many from Harvard), Columbia, Cornell, and one or two from Princeton and from University of Pennsylvania. Of course, if I went to these schools, I guess I'd use my "harvard.edu" handle also. Hm. Maybe if I were a Winklevoss twin.
• There are also applicants from this pool who are not from an Ivy League school. Some are from Big 10 schools, others are from reputable music schools, and a handful are from lesser-known schools. I don't know if these people who applied with a lesser-known email handle are graduates or faculty.
• Approximately thirty percent used their .edu handle. Others used a gmail account, and a few used their website email. Therefore, the unscientific stats above are merely compiled from the email addresses with the .edu handle.
• There are only a handful of women applying to these jobs. Now, I can't completely tell by these email addresses what their gender identity might be, but I'm assuming eleven email addresses came from female composers, including myself and the person who landed the job. What I do know is that my happy CCM bubble of having an almost equal number of male and female composers tragically popped. Why aren't more women applying? What's going on?

"During this seven-week program, I wish to work with an undergraduate in creating and implementing a Cincinnati-specific public sound art installation entitled “Next Stop.” The downtown Cincinnati streetcar (the shelters for the streetcar stops will be completed during the first quarter of 2012) will be the basis for this music composition/installation. Prerecorded snippets of narration along with a specific musical anecdote will be created for each individual stop, and these recordings will either be replayed at each streetcar shelter or inside the streetcars themselves. These individual recordings would in part create a whole musical structure, specifically unifying this piece into a complete variation form. The result of this installation will educate Cincinnatians and outside tourists about Cincinnati’s downtown historic locations while also creating musical compositions explicitly for the city. The undergraduate would help in the research of the project, mainly reading and discussing articles about the history and implementation of public sound art, researching and studying musical variation forms, and discussing with public officials about the actualization of this project. Furthermore, the student will be asked to creatively participate as much as possible, whether it be through composing musical variations for the stops, performing the musical variations, narrating, recording each piece, and/or constructing the device on which the musical variations will be heard."