Why Alissia's Grammy Nomination Signals a Needed Shift

Why Alissia's Grammy Nomination Signals a Needed Shift As only the ninth woman nominated for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical-a category that no woman has won-she's shining a spotlight on an industry overdue for real change.

By

Susan Rogers

January 30, 2025

Alissia BM 14 earned a Grammy nomination for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical-only the ninth woman to be nominated in this category.

Image courtesy of Alissia

When I learned that Alissia BM 14 recently became only the ninth woman ever to secure a Grammy nomination for Producer of the Year, Non-Classical-a category that, to date, no woman has ever won-I felt a rush of excitement, tempered by a sense of d j vu.

I remembered asking my friend Trina Shoemaker what it felt like to take the stage and receive the Grammy for Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical, in 1999 for Sheryl Crow's The Globe Sessions. Trina, who became the first woman to win a Grammy for engineering, said, My hair hurt. She couldn't wait to ditch the dress, high heels, and tight bun in her hair.

Susan Rogers

Her victory offered a glimpse of hope, but it also reminded me of the long road still ahead for women in our field.

When I started my career as a recording engineer in 1978, I dreamed of taking those steps up that Grammy stage. But despite making gold and platinum albums, my name never appeared on the nominations list.

Few women enter the technical fields of record-making: producing, engineering, mixing, and the lesser-known but no less challenging job of equipment repair. For over 22 years in the recording studio, I excelled in each role, climbing the same ladder as my male peers. My clients were those who saw no problem in having a woman fill a role that was socially considered a man's ideal job. I always worked and always had fun, despite the nerve wracking pressures of a life in the arts.

In 2018, I was at the conference table when Neil Portnow, then-president of the Recording Academy, said that women needed to step up if we expected more Grammy nominations. I felt compelled to speak up. I had stepped up-I'd been on that ladder, alongside male peers with whom I had ascended the LA music scene. Other women had stepped up and, like me, been overlooked by the Grammy-nominating body. Why?

Music-makers don't think to hire women record producers and engineers because they rarely see them.

- Susan Rogers

Is it because our work isn't good enough? That doesn't ring true when our clients range from Leonard Cohen to Beyonc , Emmylou Harris to Tool-and our records sell.

Maybe it's that entrusting a woman is viewed as too risky, a perception reflected in the limited representation of women CEOs in music's top roles, as well as the highest government offices and corporate posts. The single-digit percentage of women hired to make pop records is appalling; a 2023 study of 1,100 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 from 2012 to 2022 found that among more than 1,700 producing credits, a mere 2.8% went to women.

But the most likely possibility is the simplest: visibility. Music-makers don't think to hire women record producers and engineers because they rarely see them.

Alissia has a knack for making herself seen. Early in her career, she stood out for the doubly rare combination of being a woman who plays bass and leads a funk band. In 2014, while still a Berklee student, she recorded a video, Let It Out, which went viral and now boasts over six million views on YouTube. The video attracted attention from notable figures such as Prince-my former employer-and Bootsy Collins, among others. When labels lined up to sign her, she was determined not to be pigeonholed as just a bassist. No, this is what I do, she recently said. I love to produce. I love to be in the studio.

Listen to Alissias 2014 viral YouTube hit, Let It Out:

Forging a path in a male-dominated industry requires extraordinary patience and persistence. Women in technical roles still encounter biases that make them a rarity. As a great biologist once said, the human mind treats a new idea the way the body treats a new protein-by rejecting it. In music, that often means overlooking new possibilities simply because they don't fit the norm.

That's why Alissia's Grammy nomination means more than that of her fellow nominees-because it is rare. It underscores how urgently the industry needs to foster more pathways for women-through mentorship, training, and open-minded hiring-so that her achievement isn't just a one-off but a turning point.

Trina's win in 1999 meant more too, in part because women record-makers then felt that maybe our time had come. It hadn't, but we were headed in the right direction. Those steps up that Grammy stage, tight bun and all, are giant steps. Every one of these milestones, from Trina's to Alissia's, signal the progress that keeps us moving forward.

Susan Rogers is a professor at Berklee Online and was a longtime faculty member in Berklee's Music Production and Engineering and Liberal Arts departments. A doctor of psychology, she researches auditory memory, musical signal perception, and how training shapes our hearing. Before pivoting to science, she spent two decades as one of the few women producing, engineering, and mixing records-serving as Prince's staff engineer from 1983 to 1987 and working with Barenaked Ladies, David Byrne, and others. Rogers is the author of This Is What It Sounds Like: What the Music You Love Says About You from W. W. Norton & Company.

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