A couple of months ago, Rift sponsored a 36-hour songwriting contest. We gave singer/songwriters a topic, and the challenge for them was to craft a song in 36 hours, then perform it in front of a live audience. We had 16 participants, 13 men and three women. I considered it a success – not to mention I was thrilled – to get three women involved.

Rift recently released our first CD compilation. Of the 62 entries received, three were women vocalists, one hip-hop artist and the rest were indie rock and acoustic musicians. All 20 tracks selected for the compilation had male vocalists, except for one track which had intertwining lead male and female vocals.

I attended the Diverse Emerging Music Organization annual meeting more than a month ago. DEMO's trying to promote local and diverse music through showcases and local events, yet of the musicians who attended the meeting, 90 percent were male.

You'll notice I didn't even mention the participants' race in the first three paragraphs; in case you're wondering, it was almost 100 percent white, Caucasian or whatever the politically correct term is these days.

What's my point you ask? Sometimes I think I'm more worried about whether Rift covers enough metal, punk and hip-hop, but maybe the lack of diversity is something we should be more concerned about.

When it comes to women, my theory's that men and women are wired differently about what they're willing to take chances on. I believe women in general are more cautious on what they'll spend their time and money on when building their music or art career. I know that doesn't apply to all women, of course, but even with my very small history of relating to women, they've always seemed way more practical and mature than me.

I've no doubt in my mind women's wiring has something to do with history and dare I say it, oppression. Women in this country weren't able to vote until 1920 – that's only 86 years ago. The roles of women of have greatly expanded since then, but take one look at the makeup of our government and you'll see just how unbalanced things still are.

The latest census bureau information I have is from 2000. At that time, 89 percent of the population in Minnesota was Caucasian, 50.5 percent of the population was women. I can't tell you a specific number, but I can tell you women musicians aren't featured in 50 percent of Rift magazine; non-white musician features probably aren't even close to 10 percent.

Is there a way to help more women feel comfortable about getting their music heard? Is there a diverse community of musicians in the Twin Cities that we're missing? We also wrestle with one other thing: If we write about those musicians, the music has to be good enough to write about, or has history and oppression clouded our judgment making it impossible to do our job objectively?

This is probably the most politically charged intro I've done. I'm sure to some, or even most, this isn't a big deal, but I can't help thinking it should be.

So, where do we need to go from here? That is the question, but that question also raises more questions than I have answers for.

rich@riftmagazine.com
myspace.com/riftmagazine