| For years, women in the music industry have spoken up: they need and deserve to be more strongly represented, both in the studios and in the board rooms. But in recent months, as widespread layoffs have rippled across the industry, some women in the space have begun talking among themselves about what impact these cuts might have on their overall representation in the field. Driving some of their concern is the recent departures, amid broader restructurings, of two prominent women: Michelle Jubelirer, chair and CEO at Capitol Music Group, and Julie Greenwald, chair and CEO at Atlantic Music Group. Now one of the only remaining women at the top of a major record label group is Sony Music's Sylvia Rhone, chair and CEO at Epic Records. For years, long before these recent changes, the gender disparity at the major labels has been glaring, particularly in the UK, which requires companies with more than 250 employees to disclose such discrepancies. Last year, for example, women occupied only 31% of the highest paid jobs at Universal Music Group NV while accounting for 56% of the lowest paid jobs, according to the company's filing. "We believe the best way to flourish in our ever-changing industry is to create a team that truly reflects the incredible diversity of our artist roster and society," the company said in its report about the data. Meanwhile, at Warner Music UK, women occupied 35% of the highest paid jobs and 55% of the lowest paid roles, according to their filing. "We know that lasting change will take some time to become
fully embedded across the company; however, we are confident that our strategic approach — which places employees at the centre of our initiatives — will redesign the community and culture as you want to see it within Warner Music," the report states. Of the three majors, Sony Music in the UK fared the best. Last year, women occupied 48.4% of the highest paid jobs and 53.4% of the lowest paid ones. "We are committed to fostering an inclusive environment where all employees feel safe, valued, and empowered to contribute their unique talents and perspectives," said the report. Amid these discouraging stats, there are areas of the industry that are doing better than others. Female representation in Nashville, for example, remains strong with Cindy Mabe as chair and CEO for UMG Nashville and Cris Lacy as co-chair at Warner Music Nashville. On the publishing side, Jody Gerson helms Universal Music Publishing while Carianne Marshall sits as co-chair for Warner Chappell. And this past year, researchers at USC Annenberg, who conduct an annual gender and race/ethnicity inclusion study, saw the trend lines for representation ticking up. In 2023, the percentage of women artists on the popular charts reached an all-time high of 35%. "This is a milestone," the authors wrote, "and signals two consecutive years of consistent progress for women artists." Today also brought two bits of good news on this front. The Beatport Group announced the third iteration of its Diversity + Parity fund, which provides $150,000 to organizations that "champion diversity and equity in the dance music industry" while the Recording Academy shared that it added more than 3,000 women voting members since 2019, surpassing its goal of adding 2,500 by 2025. Still, there's lots of anxiety right now about what the latest upheavals spell for the future. In several phone calls this week, women in the space voiced their concerns to me about the possibility of the industry backsliding. Along the way, they recalled various experiences from over the years in which their prominent positions were questioned or undermined because of their gender. (Think: a female executive inviting a male counterpart to an industry event and other attendees assuming she's a plus-one.) It's not just women who are raising the alarm. During a recent conversation, one prominent male manager questioned whether the music world's growing focus on harnessing new technology and pleasing Wall Street investors — industries not known for female representation — could make things even worse in the years ahead. Some folks are also wondering, given the prevailing mood of financial austerity hanging over the industry, what's going to happen to the nascent efforts to quantify and document women's representation in the field — not to mention, the programs aiming for equal representation, as funding earmarked for diversity, equity and inclusion programs tighten up or disappear from public view as they have across several industries. "DEI has changed so much," said Erin Barra-Jean, assistant professor and director of popular music at Arizona State University. "There was not only funding, there was a good deal of lip service, as well, talking about what needed to be done. It hasn't dissipated. But it doesn't feel as emergent as it did in that moment." A 2020 study from Barra-Jean, entitled "Women In The Mix," surveyed more than 1,600 women in the industry. Of the respondents, 77% reported feeling as though they'd been treated differently in the music business because of their gender. More than 56% believed their gender had affected their employment. Not great, to say the least. Emily Lazar, founder of We Are Moving The Needle, a nonprofit dedicated to empowering women in the industry, told me she's seen cuts impacting executives working on DEI in the music space. Last year, Lazar's nonprofit released a study, entitled "Fix The Mix," that looked at how many women and non-binary people were given technical credits on top songs. The results were abysmal. They found 0% of the engineers on TikTok's 10 most-streamed tracks of 2022 were women or non-binary. The same went for producers on YouTube's 10 most-streamed songs of the year. In 2022, across the top 10 tracks of five major streaming services, only 16 of the 240 credited producers and engineers were women or non-binary (6.7%). They also found women and non-binary people were more concentrated in assistant roles. "In any other business where these numbers were unearthed, they would be besides themselves," she said. "The women in the industry are in the administrative level and knocking their heads against the glass ceiling and not getting through. That wouldn't be acceptable." How the latest turbulence ultimately impacts women in the music industry, from performers to producers to executives, won't be known for years to come. In the meantime, we'll be keeping a close eye on any changes in the trend lines. | 
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