Local community organization Girls+ Rock Ottawa launched a new artist development program in July to support women and gender-diverse individuals facing challenges in the music industry.
Girls+ Rock Ottawa was founded in 2007 and regularly hosts musical workshops, band camps and jam sessions specifically for women and gender-diverse individuals. The organization also offers a membership based gear lending program, offering musicians of all levels the use of a wide collection of instruments.
The first installment of its new program, LAUNCH // GRO Artist Development Program, is designed to help a cohort of five emerging artists record and release high quality music, as well as apply for music festivals and grants.
Creating a safe space within the industry
The five artists selected as part of the program’s nine month launch will receive biweekly sessions of voice and music production training, as well as presentations from experienced musicians, such as TIKA, and the founders of music management companies, such as KL Management.
Slayverii, a rapper and songwriter from Ottawa, is among the artists selected for this preliminary launch. She said the program will help her grow as an artist.
“The program provides [artists] with the necessary tools and hands-on experience we need to navigate ourselves within the music industry as independent artists. It’s really prepping us to become the best versions of ourselves that we want to be,” Slayverii said.
Roja Valentine, Ottawa-based singer-songwriter and producer, is also part of the cohort and said she is excited to have a safe space within the program to explore her interests.
“As a Black woman, people are very quick to label me as an R&B or hip-hop artist. Girls+ Rock lets me have that safe space to go and explore different genres that I love, free of judgment,” Valentine said. “[I can also] develop the skills that I need to be independent, without being told that as a woman, these are not things I need to learn.”
A lack of gender and ethnic diversity
According to a 2020 study on diversity in popular music, only 14.4 per cent of women worked as songwriters and only five per cent worked as music producers in 2019. Additionally, only eight out of 1,093 producing credits went to women of colour.
These statistics show a reality that both Slayverii and Valentine have grappled with.
“As a Black trans woman, a lot less opportunities are given to me. I feel like I have to work 10 times harder for something my colleagues in the music industry could obtain easily,” Slayverii said.
“In the two years I’ve been pursuing music, I’ve seen that at times people have not taken me seriously as a woman,” she said.
Valentine said she’s faced challenges because of her gender.
“I’ve contacted producers before with the intention of learning from them so that I could gain that independence when it comes to my own art,” Valentine said. “I’ve seen myself get dismissed because apparently women are not necessarily producers and are better off being ‘pretty faces’ who sing.”
Representation within the industry
Tiffanie Tri, chair of Girls+ Rock Ottawa and MA graduate from Carleton’s Norman Paterson School of International Affairs, said that it can be difficult for women artists to get bookings.
“There are so many systemic and invisible barriers,” Tri said. “Who holds the decision making power in the industry, is, right now, mostly white men. That has a huge trickle down effect in terms of who gets booked at festivals and who gets hired and paid what at festivals.”
Girls+ Rock Ottawa analyzed festival lineups, such as Ottawa Bluesfest in 2018, for gender representation.
“We found that 75 per cent of the acts listed were all cis men,” Tri said. “Where the women were placed in the festival poster is also very interesting as they tend to be found at the bottom. A festival lineup is like a work chart because it has the headliners on top and then it goes to the smaller acts at the bottom.”
Girls+ Rock compared this to the 2019 Ottawa Bluesfest lineup, which showed a slight change with 45 per cent of the acts including at least one non-cisgender male band member, but said this does not account for the placement of bands featuring women and gender nonconforming individuals lower down on the festival poster.
Tri also said the requirement of headshots alongside an artist’s music can be another barrier.
“There’s a good line from Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink which says, ‘we listen with our eyes, not just our ears,’” Tri said. “People will look at someone who presents as a woman or is gender-diverse and just assume that they can’t play as well as a dude.”
The barriers that this new artist development program is designed to help break have not discouraged Slayverii.
“Personally, my goals as an artist are to become a superstar. I’m in this for the end game and I will work my hardest to make that happen,” she said. “I want to open doors and break down barriers for Black trans women in the industry. That’s what I’m doing this for and my cause won’t change.”
Girls+ Rock Ottawa will host its first in-person event since 2020 on August 13, according to Tri. Co-presented by the SAW Gallery, the event will include an outdoor screening of Fanny: The Right to Rock, a documentary on the Filipina American rock group, as well as performances by local musicians and a possible Q&A session with the film’s director. More information about the event can be found here: https://saw-centre.com/Summer-Nights.
A previous version of this article stated Girls+ Rock Ottawa was founded in 2017. In fact, the organization was founded in 2007. The article was last updated on Aug. 5.
Featured image provided.
