We are delighted to announce that after talks with RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta, despite the station not being in the overall Gender Disparity Report (as there was no available data from the station to draw from) they have been super supportive and active in getting to us a recent study done by the station and the results look fantastic and they have just made a commitment to continue to ensure that women get a fair representation in the music they play! This is a great moment for women in Ireland who make music, especially our indigenous, native language music and music from our folk and acoustic female musicians and acts.
CAITRÍONA NÍ BHAOILL, the Oifigeach Poiblíochta & Idirlín / Press Officer said the below statement and we are delighted to share with you:
We appreciate the huge importance of this topic, and we are supportive of female musicians. We have undertaken some analysis of our airplay data, based on IMRO returns. This showed that women solo artists, or groups with women members, accounted for 47.6% of the music played on the station over the period of one week.
– CAITRÍONA NÍ BHAOILL
- This analysis is based on IMRO returns for one week, from 29 June 2020.
- That week, there were approximately 35 music programmes, 55 hours of airtime.
- Logs were not available for 3 programmes, which covered 6 hours, so the analysis is based on 49 hours of music shows, 90%.
- 573 tracks were played in total, and 273 of those were from solo women artists, or groups with women members.
- RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta did not include the 3 request programmes in this analysis as it wasn’t necessary.
We understand that the period in question in the analysis here is short, but this work had to be done by hand, within limited resources. We are confident that it paints a picture of the airplay situation on the station in terms of gender balance on any given week.
– CAITRÍONA NÍ BHAOILL
On a related matter, based on the hours of music shows, the gender balance for RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta’s music presenters is 49% women 51% men.
We are very pleased that this analysis affirms that RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta are doing well in terms of airplay for female artists, and we are committed to continuing to ensure that women get a fair representation in the music we play. We would like to wish you well with your work to draw attention to the lack of representation for women musicians on the airwaves, and hope it will lead to a change for the better.
– CAITRÍONA NÍ BHAOILL
Why Not Her would like to extend our thanks to RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta for taking the time to put this data together and for being so open to supporting women in music in Ireland, joining in their sister station Rte 2fm in showing clear signs of support for women in Music in Ireland in the last number of weeks since the Gender Disparity report was published outlining the massive disparity towards women from Ireland’s music scene.
Go raibh maith agat!
