Music industry vows to add more women to mix
Only tiny percentage of engineers and producers are female
LOS ANGELES — The Recording Academy’s Task Force on Diversity and Inclusion is going ahead with a new initiative that aims to expand opportunities for female music producers and engineers.
The Producer & Engineer Inclusion Initiative is the inaugural action of a larger strategy to address gender inequity in the music industry; the Task Force was formed last March following criticism about a lack of female representation at last year’s Grammy Awards and the industry at large.
The 2018 University of Southern California Annenberg Inclusion Initiative study suggests only two per cent of music producers and three per cent of engineers/mixers across popular music are women.
The inclusion initiative calls on any entity or individual responsible for or involved in selecting and hiring producers and engineers to commit
The music industry is at a crossroads, and progress won’t happen on its own. ” Tina Tchen, partner at Buckley Sandler LLP
to making hiring decisions only after considering a slate of candidates that includes at least two women. It also asks working producers to take gender diversity challenges in music’s technical fields into account when determining who to mentor and prepare for development and advancement opportunities.
To assist in ensuring the success of this initiative, the recording academy has committed to creating and hosting a web page dedicated solely to facilitating the process of identifying working female producers and engineers. The website enables anyone seeking to consider and hire a woman for a position to
quickly access relevant resources, including tools provided by She Is the Music and Women’s Audio Mission, leading organizations that help connect decision-makers with female producers and engineers.
“The music industry is at a crossroads, and progress won’t happen on its own. There is no magic bullet to
shift a status quo that has existed for centuries, but we see this initiative as an important step,” said Tina Tchen, task force chair and partner at Buckley Sandler LLP, who previously served as chief of staff to former U.S. first lady Michelle Obama.
“We know that change requires real commitment to intentional hiring and to providing
young women with consistent training and mentorship. We aren’t here to tell anyone who to hire, but we have seen repeatedly that the simple act of making sure diverse candidates are always seen and considered makes it more likely that women will get the opportunities they previously have been denied. It’s one step everyone can
take that could go a long way to catalyzing important change that is overdue in this industry.”
More than 200 artists, producers, labels, agencies, management companies and other stakeholders, including Justin Bieber, Cardi B, Common, Andra Day, Ariana Grande, Lady Gaga, John Legend, Shawn Mendes, Nicki
Minaj, Katy Perry, Pink, Post Malone, Carrie Underwood, Keith Urban and more have already signed on to the initiative, signifying their commitment to diversity and overcoming long standing barriers to success in the music industry.
“I’ve been very fortunate in my career to surround myself with powerful female figures. I’m proud to have a female engineer run my own Unsub Studios. I pledge to support this great initiative to provide even more opportunity to talented female producers and engineers,” said artist Katy Perry.
“As an artist and member of the recording academy, I’m proud to join this pledge and appreciate the work of the task force to bring this forward. Women deserve as much opportunity as men, and we know this industry has not always been fair. The only way to change these inequities is for us to face it directly and commit to do more,” said artist and task force member Common.