female:pressure, a transnational database and network of women and nonbinary individuals in music, has published its 2024 FACTS report, analyzing the gender distribution of artists performing at electronic music festivals worldwide.
The team at female:pressure, which has been studying gender-based booking trends since 2012, collected data from 175 editions of 110 different festivals that were held between 2022 and 2023. According to their report, women comprised 30 percent of electronic festival bookings in this period.
This statistic demonstrates a nearly 21 percent increase in female bookings compared to female:pressure’s first report in 2012. At that time, female acts made up only 9.2 percent of electronic festival bookings worldwide.
female:pressure’s 2024 FACTS report also found that 2.5 percent of all acts were non-binary and 6.9 percent were mixed, comprising both male and female members. Male acts still made up the majority of bookings—58.5 percent in the current reporting period of 2022-2023.
“We see a slow but steady rise in female and non-binary acts in electronic music festivals over the past decade, comprising almost a third of all artists booked,” the report reads. “However, there is also a continued trend of the largest festivals booking the fewest female and non-binary acts.
female:pressure’s statement continues, “Indeed, the smaller the festival, the more gender diverse its line-up is likely to be. There is clearly still a significant imbalance in gender representation on electronic music festival stages today.”
Some of these smaller festivals that booked the most women in 2023 include Austria’s Hyperreality, Sweden’s Norbergfestial and Belgium’s Horst Arts & Music. Festivals with the highest percentage of male acts were Ireland’s Audio Garden, Time Warp and Portugal’s Boom Festival.
Another recent study from music tech company A2D2 found that women account for 40% of the world’s top 10 “hardest-working” DJs, gigging twice as often as their male counterparts. The study contends these women must work extra hard “to make a mark in an industry historically dominated by males.”
Read female:pressure’s full 2024 FACTS report here.
Featured image from Unsplash.com.
