Today sees the publication of the Progressing Gender Representation In UK Dance Music report, a project driven by UK radio presenter and DJ Jaguar. It will set out the learnings from analysis of the UK dance music world, from festivals to the charts. Some of the data released so far is highly revealing: of the dance music in the UK charts, 58% is by male artists only, 37% is a result of collaborations between genders, and only 5% is by female or non-binary artists only.
Jaguar explained that a large part of the problem was underrepresentation in line-ups at festivals and events. The report showed a small improvement in gender split at festivals across the 2018-2022 period: the average percentage of female and non-binary acts comprised just 14% of the line-ups in 2018, and crept up to 21% in 2021. That’s not enough, Jaguar told Sky News: “You can’t be what you can’t see.”
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