Bay Area woman's nonprofit boost music careers for women, gender-expansive people
Only about 5% of professionals in music and audio production are women or gender-expansive people. A San Francisco woman has been working to change the face of sound for more than 20 years.
Terri Winston was directing the sound recording arts program at City College of San Francisco when she realized the scarcity of women in the class - and in the industry - in 2003.
"To not have us part of that process and that narrative, then it just blew my mind," Winston said.
So she started a club and female enrollment exploded. From that, emerged her nonprofit, Women's Audio Mission, or WAM, which works to close the gender gap in creative technology careers.
Winston says WAM's state-of-the-art San Francisco studio is the only one in the world built and run entirely by women and gender-expansive people.
"So for them to see, 'Oh wow, I can do this,' it's really cool, it's a real creative combination for people," said Winston.
From her experience as a songwriter, recording artist, producer and engineer, Winston has helped train and mentor more than 30,000 people for careers in music and audio production.
Growing up, she credits her father, a scientist-engineer, for encouraging her to explore STEM and engineering. Winston wants to do the same for others.
"Mastering all this technology is incredibly powerful. This is like driving a spaceship," she smiled.
WAM interns get hands-on experience in capturing and mixing sound. College graduate Ava Jones can now envision herself as a studio or live events engineer. Years before, she took part in WAM's Girls on the Mic program that teaches music and audio production for free to 2,000 students a year at dozens of Bay Area schools.
"It creates confidence for women and creates a safe space to learn. And that's what's so special about this," Jones said.
WAM provides skills in audio engineering, recording and mixing plus industry certificate training, and master class workshops at discounted rates. Today, more than 3,200 WAM alumni are working at or with some of the biggest names in the industry.
"We've placed people at Dolby, Meyer Sound, at Pixar, Apple, doing AV at Google. On tour with Tracy Chapman, Rosanne Cash," said Winston.
WAM's studio has worked with Beyonce's original band, the Kronos Quartet, and even won a Grammy for a collaboration with African artist Angelique Kidjo. Most recently, Winson has expanded WAM into Los Angeles in the past year.
Board member Jaye Sosa, an engineer with Skywalker Sound, says it's clear Winston has turned up the volume on creating diversity.
"Terri has this grit, enthusiasm, a deep love for the industry that's so inspiring," Sosa said.
