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Singer Megan Thee Stallion: One of the few women on the 2020 Billboard annual charts
Photo: Carmen Mandato / Getty Images
"It's International Women's Day everywhere, except in the music industry, where women's voices continue to remain mute," says Stacy L. Smith, founder and director of the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative at the University of Southern California, which in a study investigates the development in of the music industry since 2012.
The examination of all published Billboard Hot 100 showed that women made up an average of 21.6 percent of hits over the past nine years.
In 2020 their share was 20.2 percent, including Dua Lipa, Maren Morris and Megan Thee Stallion, in 2019 it was still 22.5 percent.
Few women appeared in duos (7.1 percent) or bands (7.3%); solo artists (30 percent) were most common.
The most successful artist among the 900 most popular songs on the year-end charts from 2012 to 2020 was Drake with 41 titles.
Nicki Minaj and Rihanna were the most successful women with 21 hits each.
Hardly any women at the controls
The numbers in songwriting and producing have been much lower since 2012: 12.6 percent of the Billboard annual charts were written by women, and only 2.6 percent were produced by women.
Last year, the share of female songwriters in the most popular songs of the year fell to 12.9 percent compared to 14.4 percent in 2019, women were hardly present at the controls in 2020 (2 percent; 2019: 5 percent ).
Women producers are basically nonexistent in the music industry, said Smith: "Only five percent of the songs in our sample, which spans nine years of pop music, had a producer.
In addition to the Billboard Charts, the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative also evaluated the Grammy nominations in the five examined categories of Record, Album, Song, Best New Artist and Producer from previous years.
For the year 2021, 28.1 percent of all nominees for the most important music award are women.
Here the proportion has increased over the years - in all categories except producing.
In eight of the nine years examined, there was no woman among the nominees.
The 2021 Grammy Awards ceremony will take place in Los Angeles on Sunday.
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Mariah Carey (at an appearance in Las Vegas in 2019): The only Woman of Color with a producing credit among the most popular US hits of 2020
Photo: MARIO ANZUONI / REUTERS
While equality for women in the music industry remains a long way off, the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative also has positive things to report: In 2020, artists of color were represented more strongly than ever in the past nine years, making up 59 percent of the most popular songs of the year .
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