BELFAST'S annual Women's Work festival returns this week for four days of workshops, panel discussions and live (via Zoom/YouTube) performances.
Presented by Belfast music hub Oh Yeah with the aim of helping women and those identifying as female to access all aspects of the music industry and develop related skills, this year's festival kicks off tomorrow and runs until Sunday June 20.
Acclaimed singer/songwriter, producer and podcaster Isobel Anderson is just one of the many experienced voices who will be sharing their knowledge at Women's Work 2021.
The Hastings-based artist, whose father is originally from Belfast, has an MA and PhD from the Sonic Arts Research Centre at Queen's University. Belfast is also where she first established herself as a successful solo artist in the mid-2010s - she's now amassed over 25 million Spotify streams for her self-produced, self-released music.
Tomorrow evening, Anderson will present a live edition of Girls Twiddling Knobs, her weekly and hugely successful 'women making music'-orientated podcast which recently hit 10,000 downloads.
The multi-talented musician first began putting out the podcast during lockdown last year as a way of sharing her many years experience with all the technical, practical and emotional aspects of making your own music as an independent artist – including feeling 'othered' because of your gender.
Titled Motherhood and Music, tomorrow evening's episode will be the first ever live edition of Girls Twiddling Knobs. It will feature a panel of guests joining Anderson including Olga Fitzroy, recording engineer and campaigner for freelance workers who are parents, and formerly Belfast-based violinist/composer Ruby Colley, now returning to music after having two children.
The Girls Twiddling Knobs host will also be joined by Abigail Smith, a previous participant in Women's Work's Mothers In Music Project, for which Anderson provided workshops on home recording.
"I love Women's Work, I think what they do is amazing," says the singer/songwriter, who released her most recent album Chalk / Flint in 2017.
"I've been to the festival before and participated in it as well. Oh Yeah keeps doing more and more progressive things for women, which is so good to see."
Girls Twiddling Knobs is the latest offshoot of Anderson's own free online music learning resource and community for independent female artists, Female DIY Musician (Femalediymusician.com).
As a Women's Work veteran, she believes that the fact this year's festival has been forced to go online due to Covid restrictions could actually be a 'plus' in terms of its reach.
"The fact that we'll be doing the live podcast on Zoom is kind of nice in a way, because it means that it's more accessible for people who maybe can't get to Belfast, even from elsewhere in Northern Ireland," she says.
"It's also open to anyone, basically – I'd want to encourage people to participate even if they aren't mothers themselves. For example, I don't have kids, and the doubt or the fear that I wouldn't be able to continue to pursue a creative career because of a lack of support and infrastructure definitely played a part in that decision."
Anderson says the ongoing pandemic has been "a very creative time" for her, especially as she's made a point of getting up at 6am every day in order to fit in everything she wants to do, from sharing musical knowledge and experience through producing weekly episodes of Girls Twiddling Knobs, to running the Female DIY Musician and actually working on her own music.
"Putting together the podcast took an enormous amount of creativity in thinking everything up, from the content to the branding," she admits.
"It does eat into your time, but I also find ways to kind of organise it, hopefully. For example, sometimes I'll 'batch' episodes in advance so that I can release them weekly and still be able to spend a whole month working on music.
"I also made a whole online course called Home Recording Academy which has now had nearly 200 students go through it. I built that all from scratch, made all of the learning materials and it's got a whole online community too which I manage every week.
"So I've built this whole little ecosystem around the Female DIY Musician, and that's been massively creative. Even though I've not been making music, it's still used all my creative juices."
Anderson adds: "The podcast can be very self-indulgent for me, because I get to sit down with all these wonderful people and just listen to their stories and pick their brains about what they do. I always come away having learned something new.
"I love learning and I've also found that I'm also pretty good at helping give people a 'way in' to learning new things about music. It's something that I'm quite passionate about."
Girls Twiddling Knobs live at Women's Work, Thursday June 17, 7.30pm. Advance sign-up is required for this free Zoom event via Womensworkni.co.uk, where you'll also find full details of this year's festival programme.
Today at Women's Work - Three to See
FIVE STEPS TO BETTER SONGWRITING, WITH AMANDA ST JOHN
10am on Zoom, free, advance sign-up required via Womensworkni.co.uk
JOIN singer/songwriter Amanda St John John for a workshop in which she will share songwriting tips and exercises that can help jump-start your creative process. Learn how to dig a little deeper into your own creativity, overcome your inner critic to generate ideas and build confidence in crafting your songs.
LUNCHBOX SESSIONS #1: SARA RYAN
1pm on YouTube, free
WOMEN'S Work present the first in a series of live music showcases with a performance by acclaimed Cork-based Irish Folk Awards-winner Sara Ryan.
EXPLORING VOICE, WITH SIOBHAN BROWN
2pm on Zoom, free, advance sign-up required via Womensworkni.co.uk
MANUKAHUNNEY soul singer Siobhan Brown shares useful vocal techniques to help improve your vocal delivery, build your inner confidence and develop a stronger vocal and emotional connection through the use of voice during this special Women's Work workshop for all singers and those who want to overcome their fear of singing.
