The Current: Why Music Needs More Female Role Models

Lauren Peressini
November 21, 2014


 

Courtesy of eurweb.

This past week I had the inspiring experience of volunteering at the De Pizan Honors Gala for the National Women‰’s History Museum. The event takes place annually as a fundraiser for lobbying efforts to get a National Women‰’s History Museum on the National Mall and to honor successful women who radiate power and the desire to pave the way for other women. The honorees this year included Secretary of the Interior, Sally Jewell, the CEO of General Motors, Mary Barra, NASA mathematician, Katherine Johnson, and the CEO and Founder of GoldiBlox, Debbie Sterling. It was extremely empowering to hear these notable women speak about their experiences in male-dominated fields.

One of these fields is the music industry. When I hear Forbes Magazine stating that Beyonce has made $115 million this past year, it makes me feel that women and men have equality in music, or that maybe even girls are running the music world. But this is far from the truth. It is crucial to note that the statistic of Beyonce‰’s great success came out on a list titled “ Highest-Paid Women in Music 2014.‰” It was not just a list of prosperous musicians overall. 

Courtesy of Orlando Weekly.

Emily Reo, who produces her own music, said it best in an  interview with Fader earlier this month about the lack of women in music production, “Profiling talented female producers and engineers more frequently is a start. Profiling women in the music industry without the qualifier of “female‰” would be great, since female isn‰’t a genre.‰” Less than 5% of music producers and music engineers identify as female! There still exists an archaic relationship in many studios where the typical producer is a man and the typical performer is a women.

Perhaps the disparity between women and men in the music industry exists due to the sexist nature of much mainstream music itself. Eminem recently leaked a track in which he raps: “Put that shit away, Iggy/You don’t wanna blow that rape whistle on me.‰” Iggy responded to Eminem with three tweets:

Although I may have argued that Iggy is overexposed and overall not my cup of tea, I certainly concede that her feminist beliefs make her a great musical role model. Regardless, I believe that the biggest issue in getting girls involved with activities outside of their comfort zone is the sheer lack of role models due to a sexist environment. 

At the De Pizan Honors Gala, Sec. Sally Jewell thanked her elementary school science teacher for inspiring her to become cognizant of environmental issues. In a tender moment, Jewell began to cry and say that every little girl deserves a strong female role model to inspire them to pursue greatness. In order for more girls to become involved in all aspects of the music industry, they need more role models, both musicians and producers, to look up to and aspire to become!