One of the most immediately noticeable trends in pop music post-pandemic is the increasing presence of female artists/singers and songwriters/producers. The Annenberg Inclusion Initiative at the University of Southern California (USC) conducts research on diversity and inequality across the entertainment industry, and one of their focuses is on gender equality in the music industry. A new report released earlier this year analyzed the Billboard Hot 100 year-end charts from 2012 to 2023, a period spanning 12 years, and identified 1,200 songs by 2,299 different artists. The percentage of female artists increased year over year, from 20.2% in 2020 to 35% in 2023. Among them, the increase was even more pronounced for solo artists, reaching 40.6% in 2023, up from 22.5% in 2020. It’s the highest figure recorded throughout the entire period covered by the study. What about writers and producers? The percentage of songwriters who were women in 2023 was 19.5%, up 5.4% from the previous year, while female producers made up 6.5%, representing an increase of 3%. Given the numbers hadn’t made much progress before 2022, it’s a remarkable change. The average makeup of female songwriters each year was 13.4%, typically ranging between 11% and 14%. For producers, the average was 3.2%.

Looking at the study’s breakdown by genre reveals some eye-opening facts. For example, pop has the highest representation of women, and there’s been a dramatic increase in women in R&B/soul as well. But there are also genres where it’s hard to gauge trends through the mainstream Hot 100 chart, with dance/electronic being one of them. It was more severely affected by the collapse of the live music scene due to the pandemic than any other genre, diminishing mainstream interest and resulting in only a handful of Hot 100 hits since 2020. Yet it’s precisely the dance/electronic genre where you can most palpably feel the influence of women, namely DJs and producers. What’s particularly noteworthy is that the trend stretches out further back than the pandemic. In other words, while it would be easy to assume that the pandemic’s normalization of online everything and an added emphasis on direct connections through social media have allowed women to escape the limitations of the industry’s conventional dynamics to seek new creative outlets and marketing opportunities, there’s more to the story than that.

Let’s look at the FACTS report, which tracks gender representation at electronic music festivals. The percentage of female DJs, only 9.2% in 2012, has steadily risen every year without any dip, reaching 30% by 2023. But what about star DJs, who represent not just the overall percentage but where trends are headed? DJ Mag’s annual list of top 100 DJs, a major piece that represents the state of the industry, listed only four entries with women across the entire list in 2017. The number increased to six the following year, eight in 2019, and then jumped a bit to 13 in 2020, but the figure has stagnated since then. Estimates of the number of women in the DJ scene vary. Some criteria point to somewhere in the range of 10–15%, which might seem low, but compared to the representation of producers in pop music as a whole, it’s unquestionably a higher figure.

Let’s revisit this year’s top 100 list, where Peggy Gou sits at number 10. Gou has become the most successful female DJs in recent years. Debuting at number 80 in 2019, she climbed more than 10 spots annually until she reached a peak of number nine last year. Her track “(It Goes Like) Nanana” broke out beyond the dance scene to achieve mainstream success, reaching number five on the UK Singles Chart and climbing all the way to number one in the Netherlands and in Belgium. As a result, she became the first woman to break into the top 10 and become the top house DJ. Earlier this year, she released her debut album, I Hear You, and has graced stages not just at electronic shows but at major festivals like Coachella, Primavera Sound, and Glastonbury, enjoying a kind of viral success and presence on streaming services that DJs rarely experience.

Charlotte de Witte holds the number 16 spot and has consistently been number one in techno for several years. De Witte symbolizes the resurgence the genre experienced starting around 2020. Dance music festivals have grown in size since the 2010s, with subgenres like trance, progressive, and big room music dominating for a long time thanks to their suitability for shows on big stages. While each has its own unique origins and stylistic elements, they all emphasize melody and vocals, building in sound and emotion progressively in a way that climaxes and resolves. This meshed so well with the extravagance of large stages that it actually led to a shift in what EDM is. The upper echelons of the Top 100 this year are occupied by Martin Garrix, David Guetta, and Dimitri Vegas. It may have been inevitable that techno—characterized by a darker, faster, more repetitive, beat-driven sound—would come to be seen as an alternative choice to these bigger subgenres. De Witte’s set at Tomorrowland in 2018 was the moment she gave audiences something they didn’t even know they wanted yet, bringing the immediate future into existence.

Sara Landry made her debut on the list this year at number 75, emerging as the quintessential hard techno DJ. With techno’s renewed popularity, there’s become something of a competition for high BPMs. Rather than saving songs with BPMs in the mid-130s for the climax of a show, DJs now start their sets there and head toward a peak of over 150 BPM. This trend, similar to what happened with techno pre-pandemic, initially gained traction in underground clubs before being reflected at major festivals. Earlier this year, Landry became the first hard techno DJ to take to the main stage at Tomorrowland. Whereas her style might have been considered excessively fast and extreme in the past, when the audience is fully ready to embrace it, the style quickly amplifies and elevates a show’s energy, climaxing in collective exhilaration and release. Even those unfamiliar with electronic music recognize the framework of a collective experience that pop music is already so well known for. Contemporary hip hop performances, like those from Travis Scott, are no longer just a succession of rap tracks performed in sequence. The performer’s overwhelming presence sets the mood, and their fervently loyal fans complete the experience. That’s why hard techno is more at home at a traditional rave than on a big stage decked out with giant LED screens, fireworks, and confetti. Landry’s best-known performance is still her Boiler Room set from 2023.

Today, these three DJs are all the faces of less mainstream subgenres like house and techno on the top 100 list. From 2018 to 2021, DJ Mag made a separate list focused on lesser-known genres called the Alternative Top 100 DJs. In 2021, Charlotte de Witte was number one, and Peggy Gou was number four. Half of the top 10 were women, including Nina Kraviz, Nora En Pure, and Amelie Lens, another star DJ of the techno scene. The list suggests the possibility that women DJing might have had more opportunities to present a more diverse range of music at smaller clubs and events than at major festivals, which are dominated by tested genres and famous DJs. We’re currently seeing these leading women with amazing potential take the main stage during the daytime or the closing set on smaller stages. Maybe, when it comes to dance/electronic, the very best stages are reserved in a way that’s less flexible than what we’ve seen in pop with icons like Beyoncé or Taylor Swift. Despite that, or perhaps precisely because of it, it’s absolutely thrilling just imagining what could be, and something we anticipate that much more.