female musicians still in the minority on stage

This is not a French exception. Worldwide, female artists are less scheduled than men, especially on major stages. But initiatives launched in Alsace aim to reduce these inequalities and give visibility to female musicians.

Where are the women in 2024? Obviously, not on the Alsatian concert stages. This year, they were once again largely forgotten in the programming of the region's main festivals. At the Colmar Wine Fair, for example, single women on stage represented only 20% of all scheduled artists. At Décibulles, 11%.

Contacted on this subject, Nicolas Pierrat, artistic director of the FAV, gives his point of view: “In the programming, we are constrained by the artists who are on tour. Some years, we are better served than others. And it is not because we have a woman on stage that the audience will be female. This year, we had Patrick Bruel, for example, and the audience was very female.”

Despite everything, the figure is striking. According to an inventory from the National Music Center, women represented only 17% of headliners scheduled in France in 2019, all types of stages combined.

And in five years, nothing has changed. For many female artists, this is a state of affairs with which they have had to learn to deal. “Leaving room for women in this environment is not innate. Even in front of your audience, you have to assert yourself,” explains Nouffissa Kabbou, a Franco-Moroccan musician based in Strasbourg. “Putting that hardness on your face to say: I’m the one who decides.”

Nisni, a 19-year-old beatmaker from Strasbourg, decided not to adapt to this predominantly male environment: “In France, there is no female figure in beatmaking [composition de mélodies sur un logiciel]. In the studio, I felt a gap. As soon as I proposed something, it was put aside. But I don't want to change myself to be accepted. I want us to [les femmes] impose our style, let us show ourselves, I want to break masculine codes.”

To compensate for this under-representation of women in the world of music, Nouffissa Kabbou hopes to see things change: “At the local level, means must be put in place to support the musical and artistic creation of women, and for them to be more visible on the musical scene.”

And the process has already started, through several actions in Strasbourg.

The Music&lles festival, organized by Sturm Production, is based on an exclusively female program. “Before, we organized a full season, but we only had full houses in March and November, when the media talked about women's rights day and the conference to combat violence against women. So now we organize a festival twice a year on these dates,” explains Séverine Cappiello, the director.

And this festival pursues two goals: to highlight the musical heritage, “a word that has existed since the 13th^e century”specifies Séverine Cappiello, and question the question of gender within the music sector.

To encourage women to engage in musical creation, associations often turn to “selected mix” workshops. That is to say reserved for women or sexized people (transgender or non-binary).

Nouffissa Kabbou, who runs a series of creative workshops within the Music&lles festival, explains the approach: “We should not see this as a war of the sexes, but really as a way to create a space for expression and common intimacy between women.”

For Céline Petrovic, who founded the wom.x program (for woman who mix: women who mix) in Strasbourg in 2021, these workshops allow women to develop technique but also self-confidence. “[Pour être DJ]you have to feel legitimate to go on stage. In addition to mixing workshops, we organize discussions to identify situations of sexism […]to be able to overcome that.”

The Horizome association, which welcomes young people from the neighborhood to its recording studio in Hautepierre (Strasbourg), was also tempted. “We have maybe 10% of girls who come through the studio door.” deplores Grégoire Zabé, its president. “So we try to offer a little more to young women who want to experiment. [Dans le cadre de Music&lles]we offered a workshop led by beatmaker Nisni and dedicated to a female audience.”

And these first Alsatian initiatives are starting to bear fruit. Céline Petrovic is delighted to have been able to propel around fifteen young women to the forefront of the electro scene: “We even have one mixing in Berlin now. And another in London.”

For its director, wom.xa has succeeded in making things happen in the Alsatian capital. “Over the past few years, we have seen things evolve. At Kalt [célèbre club électro de Strasbourg]it is in their charter to program as many women as men. And in a lot of places, it would no longer occur to people to have a night out with just guys.”

See you in a few years to judge the success of these actions.