A B O U T ' W O M E N I N J A Z Z '
'Women in Jazz' is a project which aims to amplify the voices of female and non-binary jazz musicians.
Many exceptional female jazz musicians have received nowhere near the recognition of their male peers. 'Women in Jazz' hopes to change that trend, one story at a time. Each month, creator and host Earanee Niedzwiecki sits down with a different artist to discuss her what got her into jazz, her experience developing as a performer, and what life is like as a professional jazz musician today. The 'Women in Jazz' project has also expanded to a regular #WomenofJazzHistory feature - currently posted on Instagram - spotlighting one prolific female jazz musician of the past.
The woman behind the PROJECT: EARANEE NIEDZWIECKI
Earanee is a Lindy Hop and authentic jazz dance performer, instructor, choreographer and DJ from Adelaide, Australia, now based in Brussels, Belgium.
A lover of artists like Nat King Cole and Louis Armstrong since childhood, Earanee developed a real love for jazz in high school, studying saxophone and later jazz vocals. After graduating, Earanee’s love for jazz transferred to dance, when she discovered Lindy Hop in 2010.
The idea for ‘Women in Jazz’ came to Earanee at a jazz jam in 2018, as she watched the female musicians being excluded and treated poorly by the young, majority group of male musicians - it occurred to her just how much some female jazz musicians might have to love jazz to put in the work, in spite of their treatment on the band stand, and the relative lack of female role models recognised in jazz history. As the saying goes, “You can’t be what you can’t see”, right? Hoping to remedy the lack of women's stories in jazz, and taking inspiration from her love of podcasts and interviews, the 'Women in Jazz' project was born.