women in music 10

6duC...5Zeg
21 Feb 2024
33

Other musical professions[edit]

Record producing and sound engineering[edit]

A 2013 Sound on Sound article stated that there are "few women in record production and sound engineering."[12] Ncube states that "[n]inety-five percent of music producers are male, and although there are female producers achieving great things in music, they are less well-known than their male counterparts."[12] "Only three women have ever been nominated for best producer at the Brits or the Grammys" and none won either award.[227] "Women who want to enter the [producing] field face a boys' club, or a guild mentality."[227]
Despite this, women haven been taking on the challenge since the 1940s. Mary Shipman Howard was an engineer in New York City in the 1940s. Lillian McMurry was a record producer and founder of Trumpet Records in the 1950s. One of the first women to produce, engineer, arrange and promote music on her own rock and roll music label was Cordell Jackson (1923–2004). She founded the Moon Records label in Memphis in 1956 and began releasing and promoting on the label singles she recorded in her home studio, serving as engineer, producer and arranger. Ethel Gabriel had a 40-year career with RCA and was the first major label record producer.[citation needed]
Trina Shoemaker is a mixer, record producer and sound engineer responsible for producing/engineering and/or mixing records for bands such as Queens of the Stone Age,[228] Sheryl Crow,[228] Emmylou Harris,[228] Something for Kate,[228] Nanci Griffith[228] and many more. In 1998 Shoemaker became the first woman to win the Grammy Award for Best Engineered Album for her work on The Globe Sessions.[229] In addition to Crow, Shoemaker went on to work with artists such as Blues Traveller, Emmylou Harris, the Indigo Girls and the Dixie Chicks.[230]
Other women include:

DJs and turntablists[edit]

A DJ mixing two record players at a live event
Women in music are often seen mainly in singing roles in popular music and there are relatively few women DJs or turntablists in hip hop music, house music, nu metal and other genres where DJs and turntablists participate. Indeed, all of these genres are very male-dominated. Part of this may stem from a general low percentage of women in audio technology-related jobs, such as audio engineering and production. In 2007 Mark Katz's article "Men, Women, and Turntables: Gender and the DJ Battle," stated that "very few women battle; the matter has been a topic of conversation among hip-hop DJs for years."[231] In 2010 Rebekah Farrugia stated "the male-centricity of EDM culture" contributes to "a marginalisation of women in these [EDM] spaces."[232] While turntablism and broader DJ practices should not be conflated, Katz suggests use or lack of use of the turntable broadly by women across genres and disciplines is impacted upon by what he defines as "male technophilia."[231] Historian Ruth Oldenziel concurs in her writing on engineering with this idea of socialization as a central factor in the lack of engagement with technology. She explains: "an exclusive focus on women's supposed failure to enter the field ... is insufficient for understanding how our stereotypical notions have come into being; it tends to put the burden of proof entirely on women and to blame them for their supposedly inadequate socialization, their lack of aspiration, and their want of masculine values. An equally challenging question is why and how boys have come to love things technical, how boys have historically been socialized as technophiles."[233]
DJ Virgin is a London, UK-based DJ.
Lucy Green has focused on gender in relation to musical performers and creators, and specifically on educational frameworks as they relate to both.[234] She suggests that women's alienation from "areas that have a strong technological tendency such as DJing, sound engineering and producing" are "not necessarily about her dislike of these instruments but relates to the interrupting effect of their dominantly masculine delineations."[235] Despite this, women and girls do increasingly engage in turntable and DJ practices, individually[236] and collectively,[237] and "carve out spaces for themselves in EDM and DJ Culture."[232] There are various projects dedicated to the promotion and support of these practices, such as Female DJs London.[238] Some artists and collectives go beyond these practices to be more gender-inclusive.[239] For example, Discwoman, a New York-based collective and booking agency, describe themselves as "representing and showcasing cis women, trans women and genderqueer talent."[240]

Movements, organizations, events and genres[edit]

Women's music[edit]

Bernice Johnson Reagon (born 1942) is a singer, composer, scholar, and social activist, who founded the a cappella ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock in 1973. She was an important figure in the womyn's music scene.
Women's music (also womyn's music or wimmin's music) is music "by women, for women, and about women".[241][242] The genre emerged as a musical expression of the second-wave feminist movement[243] as well as the labor, civil rights, and peace movements.[244] The movement (in the US) was started by lesbians such as Cris Williamson, Meg Christian and Margie Adam, African-American musicians (including Linda Tillery, Mary Watkins, Gwen Avery) and activists such as Bernice Johnson Reagon and her group Sweet Honey in the Rock, and peace activist Holly Near.[244] Women's music also refers to the wider industry of women's music that goes beyond the performing artists to include studio musicians, producers, sound engineers, technicians, cover artists, distributors, promoters, and festival organizers who are also women.[241]

Organizations[edit]

International Alliance for Women in Music[edit]

The International Alliance for Women in Music (IAWM) is an international organization of women and men dedicated to fostering and encouraging the activities of women in music, particularly in the areas of musical activity, such as composing, performing, and research, in which gender discrimination is an historic and ongoing concern. The IAWM engages in efforts to increase the programming of music by female composers, to combat discrimination against female musicians, including as symphony orchestra members, and to include accounts of the contributions of women musicians in university music curricula. To end gender discrimination, the IAWM led successful boycotts of the American concerts of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in the 1990s; the "VPO watch" continues.[245] Advocacy by the organization has contributed to the inclusion of women composers in college music history textbooks.[246]

Women in Music (WIM-NY)[edit]

Women in Music (WIM-NY) is an American organization based in New York City which was founded in 1985. It aims to "support, cultivate and recognize the talents of women" in music.[247] WIM-NY holds activities and events, including "seminars, panels, and networking events."[247] As well, it gives out annual Touchstone Awards to women in music. WIM-NY members include "record label executives, artist managers, songwriters, musicians, attorneys, recording engineers, agents, publicists, studio owners, music publishers, online and traditional marketers" from "all genres of music and all areas of the [music] industry."[247] As of 2015, the president is lawyer Neeta Ragoowansi and the vice-president is lawyer Jennifer Newman Sharpe. As of 2015, the board of directors includes women from Nielsen Music, Warner Music Group, Ableton, Downtown Music Publishing and the Berklee College of Music.

Women in Music Canada[edit]

Women in Music Canada Professional Association (WIMC) is an organization based in Toronto, Ontario, that was established in 2012. It is a federally registered non-profit organization that aims to "foste[r] equality in the music industry through the support and advancement of women."[248] WIMC is financially supported by the federal government, the FACTOR program, the Ontario government and Slaight Music.

Women in Music (WIM-UK)[edit]

Women in Music (WIM-UK) is a United Kingdom "membership organization that celebrates women's music making across all genres of music."[249] WIM-UK works to raise "awareness of gender issues in music and support women musicians in their professional development."[249] WIM-UK's website provides information on competitions and job opportunities.[249] WIM-UK does a survey of the numbers of women composers, conductors and soloists who appear in the BBC Proms, the "largest classical music festival in the world." For the 2015 Proms, women composers made up 10% of the program, women conductors made up 4% of the 50 conductors and female instrumental soloists made up 30%.[250]

Now Girls Rule (Mexico)[edit]

Elis Paprika, founder of Now Girls Rule, performing at Playtime Festival in Mongolia in 2019
Now Girls Rule is a Mexican feminist organization created for the empowerment and promotion of women artists, and women-fronted acts and bands, that celebrates music created by women, as well generating spaces and expanding the art scene in Mexico by focusing on the creation of new generations of artists through education and inspiration.[251][252] Now Girls Rule was founded by independent Mexican rock musician Elis Paprika in 2014, drawing the name from her single "Now Girls Rule" released that year, where she featured other important Latin American women artists Sandrushka Petrova and Ana Cristina Mo from the band Descartes a Kant, Renee Mooi, and Vanessa Zamora. Throughout her career, Elis Paprika has continuously brought attention to the fact that, despite the enormous number of talented women artists, the Mexican music scene has historically failed in the promotion and creation of appropriate spaces and opportunities for women in music.
Now Girls Rule features several annual events. Girl Camps feature music and fanzine design lessons for young girls ages 7–17; all teachers are established woman artists from the Mexican music scene.[253] The format was created for young aspiring artists to meet and learn from women who have pursued their dreams and worked to make a living from their art, so they can be inspired to develop careers in music and art. Now Girls Rule Nights are a series of live concerts featuring established women artists and women-fronted bands, while inviting up-and-coming women-fronted acts to perform, to reach new crowds. Now Girls Rule Networkings are a space where professional women of various backgrounds and women artists come together to meet and talk about their work in the hopes of joining forces in new ventures and projects. La Marketa, the first-ever all-women artists' bazaar in Mexico, was created so that artists can directly sell their merchandise to their fans and keep 100% of their sales.[254] La Marketa is an all-age, gender-inclusive, and pet-friendly event featuring live performances by some of the artists. Elis Paprika also hosts the Now Girls Rule Podcast, a weekly show through Vive Latino's Señal VL channel, that features music by women artists and women-fronted acts she has met around the world while touring.

Riot Grrrl[edit]

Carrie Brownstein from the punk-indie band Sleater-Kinney, performing at Vegoose in 2005
Riot grrrl is an underground feminist hardcore punk movement that originally started in the early 1990s, in Washington, D.C.,[255] and the greater Pacific Northwest, noticeably in Olympia, Washington.[256] It is often associated with third-wave feminism, which is sometimes seen as its starting point. It has also been described as a musical genre that came out of indie rock, with the punk scene serving as an inspiration for a musical movement in which women could express themselves in the same way men had been doing for the past several years.[257]
Riot grrrl bands often address issues such as rape, domestic abuse, sexuality, racism, patriarchy, and female empowerment. Bands associated with the movement include Bikini Kill, Bratmobile, Heavens to Betsy, Excuse 17, Huggy Bear, Cake Like, Skinned Teen, Emily's Sassy Lime, Sleater-Kinney, and also queercore groups like Team Dresch.[258][259] In addition to a music scene and genre, riot grrrl is a subculture involving a DIY ethic, zines, art, political action, and activism.[260] Riot grrrls are known to hold meetings, start chapters, and support and organize women in music.[261]
The use of the word girl was meant to indicate a time when girls are least influenced by societal pressures and therefore have the strongest self-esteem – childhood. The anger behind the movement was noted by the alternate spelling of the word as grrrl, which sounds like a growl.[261]
They partook in a new type of punk feminism that promoted the idea of do-it-yourself, exchanging manifestos and trading mixed tapes of favorite bands to get the word out.[262] They were tired of women being erased from history or having their experiences misinterpreted and ignored by others. In response to patriarchal violence, adultism, and heterocentrism,[263] riot grrrls engage in negative emotional expressions and rhetoric similar to that of feminism and the punk aesthetic. The feminist argument that "the personal is political" was revisited in the image that riot grrrl set forth, similarly to the culture of punk that self-actualization is not to be found in external forces but rather through an individual's true self. By recognizing and reevaluating the institutional structures that affect individual experiences within social situations, an individual can gain the knowledge to better know herself and therefore know how to present herself to others so that they may know her accurately. Riot grrrl termed this movement to self-actualization girl love – "girls learning to love themselves, and each other, against those forces that would otherwise see them destroyed or destroy themselves."[This quote needs a citation]
The accompanying slogan "every girl is a riot grrrl" reinforces the solidarity that women can find amongst themselves. This creates an intimate aesthetic and sentimental politic well expressed in the production of zines (a shortened version of fanzines).[261] Zines are handmade, crafted by individuals who want to connect directly with their readers, with simple items like scissors, glue, and tape. They call out injustices and challenge the norms that typically direct the expression of sexuality and domestic abuse, providing a space for women to exchange personal stories to which many others could relate. They challenge girls and women alike to stand up for themselves in a political atmosphere that actively seeks to silence them.[263] The shared personal stories have been, at times, met with attitudes that reduced the communication to "it's all just girls in their bedrooms, sprawled out writing in their diaries, and then they'll send them to each other",[This quote needs a citation] while the choice to share in that way is an aesthetic one.
In the midst of this raising of awareness, riot grrrls had to address the generalizations that worked for them but that could not apply to women of color. Not all girls could be riot grrrl after all, for lack of privilege barred them from participating in such acts as writing SLUT across their stomach in an attempt to reclaim sexual agency.[262] While the performance is an earnest one, racism had already labeled women of color as that term. As observed by Kearny, "the gender deviance displayed by riot grrrls is a privilege to which only middle-class white girls have access."[263] Another aspect of this need for inclusive discourse arose in the movement's preference for concrete knowledge and a disregard for the abstract that would foster theoretical inquiry.

Festivals[edit]

Women's music festivals, which may also be called womyn's music festivals, have been held since the 1970s. Some women's music festivals are organized for lesbians. The first women's music festival was held in 1973 at Sacramento State University. In May 1974 the first National Woman's Music Festival was held in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, founded by University of Illinois student Kristin Lems.[264] It celebrated its 40th year in Middleton, Wisconsin, from 2–5 July 2015.[265] As of 2015, it is a four-day event that includes concerts, workshops, comedy, theatre, films and writing events that "promote and affirm the creative talents and technical skills of women" from diverse, multicultural communities, including women with disabilities. While most attendees are women, men can attend.[266] The Michigan Womyn's Music Festival was created in 1976, and became the largest festival in the United States.[267]: 28
An example of a festival that focuses on music is the Women in Music Festival held by the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music. The festival began in 2005 as a celebration of the contributions of women to composition, performance, teaching, scholarship, and music administration.[268] From its modest beginnings of Eastman students and faculty members performing music by women composers, the Festival has grown to include additional concerts and events throughout Rochester, New York, and to host composers-in-residence, who have included Tania León (2007), Nancy Van de Vate (2008), Judith Lang Zaimont (2009), Emma Lou Diemer (2010), and Hilary Tann (2011). The festival has presented more than 291 different works by 158 composers.
Many other festivals have been created throughout the United States and Canada since the mid-1970s and vary in size from a few hundred to thousands of attendees. The Los Angeles Women's Music Festival began in 2007 with over 2500 attendees. Events outside the US include the Sappho Lesbian Witch Camp, near Vancouver, British Columbia, in Canada and the Sistajive Women's Music Festival in Australia. Some festivals are focused around the lesbian community, such as the Ohio Lesbian Festival, near Columbus, Ohio, which was created in 1988; Christian Lesbians Out (CLOUT), which holds a gathering in early August in Washington, D.C.; The Old Lesbian Gathering, a festival in Minneapolis, Minnesota; and RadLesFes, an event held in the middle of November near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Feminist-oriented festivals include the Southern Womyn's Festival in Dade City, Florida; the Gulf Coast Womyn's Festival in Ovett, Missouri; Wiminfest in Albuquerque, New Mexico; Womongathering, the Festival of Womyn's Spirituality; the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, near Hart, Michigan; and the Midwest Womyn's Festival in DeKalb, Illinois.
While women's music festivals are centered on music, they support many other facets of lesbian and feminist culture. Some festivals are designed to provide a safe space for women's music and culture. Many festivals are held on college campuses or in remote rural locations, where attendees stay in campsites. Many festivals offer workshops on arts, crafts, fitness, and athletic events that women may not be able find in mainstream culture. In her book Eden Built by Eves, Bonnie Morris describes how women's music festivals serve women throughout the stages of their lives. Since the festivals are organized by women, for women, daycare and childcare facilities are typically provided. Festivals often provide a safe space for coming of age rituals for young women, adult romance and commitment ceremonies, the expression of alternative perspectives on motherhood, and the expression of grief and loss.[267]

Lilith Fair[edit]

Lilith Fair co-founder Sarah McLachlan
Lilith Fair was a concert tour and travelling music festival that consisted solely of female solo artists and female-led bands. It was founded by Canadian musician Sarah McLachlan, Nettwerk Music Group's Dan Fraser and Terry McBride, and New York talent agent Marty Diamond. It took place during the summers of 1997 to 1999, and was revived in the summer of 2010.[269] McLachlan organized the festival after she became frustrated with concert promoters and radio stations that refused to feature two female musicians in a row.[270] Bucking conventional industry wisdom, she booked a successful tour for herself and Paula Cole. At least one of their appearances together – in McLachlan's home town, on 14 September 1996 – went by the name "Lilith Fair" and included performances by McLachlan, Cole, Lisa Loeb and Michelle McAdorey, formerly of Crash Vegas.
The next year, McLachlan founded the Lilith Fair tour, taking Lilith from the medieval Jewish legend that Lilith was Adam's first wife. In 1997, Lilith Fair garnered a $16 million gross, making it the top-grossing of any touring festival.[270] Among all concert tours for that year, it was the 16th highest grossing.[270] The festival received several pejorative nicknames, including "Breast-fest" and "Girlapalooza."[271][272]

See also[edit]


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