Abbey Road Equalise

This International Women's Day, Abbey Road Equalise invites the next generation of female and non-binary artists and creatives to a free day of recording workshops happening across 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 & 8 March.

This year we're offering six days of immersive recording workshops, providing hands-on learning opportunities for eight aspiring female or non-binary engineers and producers each day.

Learn from our talented female engineering team, gaining invaluable insights into their expertise and creative processes, observe studio etiquette, participate and contribute to new music from some of the most talked-about, relevant and ground-breaking artists of 2025. This is your chance to learn from the industry's best, expand your network and elevate your skills.

A Taster of What's To Come

How To Enter

Sign up for a ticket.

Sign up here

Ballot closes & winners announced

The ballot closes on Sunday 23 February at 23:59PM and winners will be selected and notified on Monday 24 February. Please note, if you are travelling from abroad, we will not be able to cover travel or accommodation.

What To Expect

The day will begin at 10AM where you will be greeted by our talented female engineers who will guide you into Studio Three and give you a breakdown of the day.

Our engineers will give you a tour of the studio, looking at the set up of the live room and control room. You'll learn about the carefully selected microphones, instruments and gear, understanding the reasoning behind each choice.

Throughout the day, our engineers will share their expertise through insightful lectures and demonstrations. You'll have the opportunity to observe, contribute and learn about the various techniques employed.

All questions are welcome!

The Line-Up

3 March Since emerging with the alternative indie smarts of searing debut single Slip! in 2021, and vibrant, varied first EP We Speak of Tides shortly after, London artist Aziya has been cementing herself as a musical triple-threat. Influenced by the multiple talents of childhood hero Prince, she’s an artist with naturally powerful vocals, but also a deft and enviable mastery of her guitar and an increasingly independent grip on production. Heading into her next phase with a second EP set for release this summer, she’s already carving out an ambitious space for herself where she can create with complete artistic control. Growing up in a modern household where genre was never seen as a boundary, with System of a Down, Santigold and The Stone Roses played on the same speakers, from a young age Aziya was encouraged to follow her musical inclinations, picking up a guitar aged 10 and starting to pen early attempts at her own material shortly after. But there remains a notable gulf between your average creatively-inclined young person from a supportive family and the incredibly driven, career-orientated artist she stands as today. The turning point - aside from those early inspirations (Stevie Nicks, Patti Smith and Sister Rosetta Tharpe are also namechecked as key formative figures) - she explains came back in 2018. Though she recalls her time there as hugely important, when she graduated she found herself in sessions where her tastes and ideas were being ignored. “I remember leaving one particular session thinking, ‘I’m gonna get my guitar playing and producing to a point where I’m able to express myself as a musician the exact way I want to’,” she explains. Today, she describes We Speak of Tides as an EP that helped cement that ambition, laying the foundations for Aziya as an artist. You can also get a sense of her immaculate musical appetite via the wealth of riff-heavy, one-woman-band covers she’s been posting online since those early days; to date, her TikTok videos have received nearly five million likes. Tackling everyone from PJ Harvey, to Aussie psych weirdos Pond to Jimi Hendrix, when she uploaded a take on Grimes Oblivion - complete with looped live instruments, angular guitars and on-point vocals - the Canadian singer even reposted the cover on her own socials. Grimes hasn’t been the only famous fan to back Aziya either. Over the past two years, she’s been handpicked to support The Vaccines, Nova Twins and The Amazons; at the end of 2022, meanwhile, she opened up for Florence + the Machine at London’s O2 Arena, ticking off two long term goals at once. Having connected and toured with an important array of fellow female musicians across the last few years, the camaraderie and support has been a huge source of encouragement; “We’re all striving for the same thing, so there’s no need for rivalry because you’re just in awe of that other woman on stage,” she says. It’s perhaps no surprise, then, that in her new material Aziya has been doing it for the girls, honing in on her biggest female influences (Santigold, Grimes, Debbie Harry) and pulling their energy through to a collection of tracks that inhabit their musical heritage proudly whilst pushing it firmly into the now.

4 March Divorce cite a broad range of influences, from contemporary indie heavyweights like Vampire Weekend, Mitski, and Big Thief, to cult icons such as Tom Waits and LCD Soundsystem. The Nottingham band burst onto the scene in 2022 with their explosive debut EP Get Mean and continued to expand their horizons with their second EP Heady Metal acquiring key champions at press and radio. Moving strength to strength, they returned in 2024 with indie anthems Gears and My Room cementing their status as one of the most exciting UK artists to watch out for. Trademark theatricality is at the forefront of every Divorce performance. Through every fanciful music video, alongside consistent displays of outstanding musicality at live shows, the band have captivated audiences of thousands across the U.K and Europe. With a prolific live schedule and sold out tour under their belts, Divorce promise greatness with their debut album Drive to Goldenhammer set for release March 2025.

6 March Growing up in Yorkshire on a diet of Genesis and Bruce Springsteen, Fiona-Lee's unique and standout vocals channel Alanis Morrisette and Sam Fender through her confessional songwriting. Fiona-Lee has rounded her experiences of grief, uncertainty, and frustration into an EP of stoic feminine power, featuring tracks produced with Hugo White of The Maccabees and mixed by Grammy-award winner Alan Moulder, out 7 March 2025. Her anthemic debut offering Mother gained early champions in press and radio, and follow up single Nothing Compares To Nineteen saw the track added to key genre playlists and Fiona-Lee on multiple Spotify covers. Her formidable live vocals have already translated to several key festival slots, including debut appearances at TRNSMT, Kendal Calling, and Boardmasters, with upcoming performances at Eurosonic and YNOT.

5 March Man/Woman/Chainsaw are Billy Ward (vocals, guitars), Emmie-Mae Avery (vocals,keys/synths), Vera Leppänen (vocals, bass), Clio Starwood (violin) and Lola Cherry (drums). A precociously talented band from London, who recently celebrated their 100th gig. Since their debut at 16 years old and across three self-released singles,the band have proven themselves as one of the most exciting and unpredictable young acts in the capital, both joyous and raucous in equal measures. Last year’s What Lucy Found There was to be their breakthrough, securing attention for the band from the likes of The Quietus, NME, The Line Of Best Fit, So Young, BBC 6 Music and more. This November the band truly come of age with their debut EP, Eazy Peazy, to land on the indie taste-maker label Fat Possum Records. Recorded with Gilla Band’s Daniel Fox at Echo Zoo studio in Eastbourne, the group present us with cinematic arrangements, mauled by moments of cacophony; the band’s Billy Ward says of their writing process, “we thrive on the thin line between pretty and noisy, often trying to jump between the two-it’s that chaos that excites us.” From the driving immediacy of opener The Boss, to the robust backbone of SportsDay, to the theatrical beauty of Grow A Tongue In Time and orchestral highlight Ode To Clio, the six track EP captures all the cerebral intensity, and celebratory melody, of the Man/Woman/Chainsaw live performance. It signals the start proper for a band who have been allowed to experiment, given the time to find their sound and line-up in a vibrant, supportive DIY community, and who will surely finish the year ready to take on the next with unbridled confidence. With boundless potential like theirs, you’d not bet against them.

8 March Luvcat and her band are concocting a riot of Parisian decadence and British sweat ‘n sawdust; romance, danger, escapism and good old fashioned rock’n’roll. Her early rise has been as thrilling and immediate as the songs themselves - tales of doomed loves and twisted fantasy, that have seen her loyal following swell in number by the day. But to paraphrase a great man, first we must ask ourselves, how did we get here? One theory goes that Luvcat was born not so long ago, on the banks of the River Seine in the belly of a riverboat when, had you been passing by, you might have found a group of revellers clutching hand-branded silk knickers, in thrall to the woman on stage with her name emblazoned across them. OR, according to BBC Radio 1, who broadcast the tale ahead of playing first single ‘Matador’, Luvcat began several years back when she ran away to join the circus and had a tempestuous affair with a ringleader. OR, perhaps, the seeds of Luvcat were sown on the streets of Liverpool almost a decade ago, when the teenage musician was discovered busking The Whole of the Moon by one of the actual Waterboys and subsequently taken on a serendipitous support tour around Europe. Some or none of this is true; you can make up your own minds as to which. Raised on a simultaneous diet of Nick Cave and Cabaret; The Cure and The Rat Pack, Luvcat grew up equally enthralled with both the gothic and the glamorous. She reminisces over “always wanting to be a Moulin Rouge dancer” but also had her world turned upside down when she first watched the video for Lullaby by The Cure. “Its essence has just informed my entire brain ever since,” she says. “There was a dead marching band covered in cobwebs, and Robert Smith is in candy stripe pyjamas on this wrought iron bed.” Now, she’s tying the two together in a flurry of theatrical playfulness and high stakes desire, with the artist herself taking the creative lead on all of her videos to curate a world of Luvcat’s very own making. On that first single, Matador, it manifests in the form of a curiously-plucked gothic folk tale that tells the story of a destructive sort of love; the kind that has you “crawlin’ in on all fours”. “Every time I was in Liverpool, I could smell him; I’d know when he was there,” Luvcat recalls of the man in question. “It was tumultuous but inspiring. I saw him in the Kazimier Garden and, as he was leaving, he had this Spanish bolero-like jacket on and I wrote the word ‘Matador’ in my phone. I wrote the song the next day.” Indeed, it’s these kinds of trysts and temptations that feed Luvcat’s dark vaudevillian world as a whole. “I love the kind of hopeless love where you’d take a bullet for someone,” she says. “The heartbeat of this whole thing is sex, love and strangeness; falling in and out of love and the mad things that happen along the way.” Suffice to say, many mad things have already thrown themselves into Luvcat’s orbit in the pursuit of pleasure. Once, she was whisked off to the Pigalle for an impromptu weekend of fine food and four poster beds by a visiting sailor - the twist? “I’d recently written a song about a date with a stranger ending up there in Paris. Within three weeks it happened.” A current live set favourite, Love and Money, winks at a conversation between the singer and an ex-lover, where they joked about making a sex tape to fund their adventures. Even her first foray onto TikTok (a platform that’s now embraced Luvcat wholly, to the point that second single He’s My Man was all-but-demanded by her followers) was only as a means to post some found CCTV footage of Luvcat reuniting with a former flame, dancing - red wine in hand - to Sinatra’s That’s Life. The fans, however, made a smart call. He’s My Man - a scorched murder ballad that sounds like little else in the modern music sphere - distils Luvcat’s sense of timeless, eternal desire into four minutes of yearning strings and feminine need; of how, so easily, “love can become obsession”. “Obviously I’m a strong independent woman - of course!” she laughs. “But that undying love, the kind from the old black and white films - I kind of miss that.” The comments section might cry out for these songs to soundtrack the moves of dangerous women like Killing Eve’s Villanelle or Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but just as crucial is Luvcat’s softer, sweeter underbelly - plus a capacity for a cheeky, knowing wink. Take forthcoming track (and another online favourite), Dinner @ Brasserie Zedel. “I always said I’d marry the first man who takes me to Brasserie Zedel. I don’t want the world, I just want a 16 quid prawn cocktail,” she smiles. Stopping off to play an intimate set in the legendary Piccadilly restaurant’s underground jazz bar at the end of September, Zedel marked the latest in a run of typically eventful - and typically packed-to-the-seams - early shows for Luvcat. Their debut Liverpool and London headlines sold out in around four minutes. At the former, Luvcat was greeted by not one but three exes facing her from the crowd; at the latter, gazing out from under a pillbox hat, she saw another former lover trying to break in up the stairs. With a debut tour set for November, she might need to hire a security detail to keep a check on desperate former flames weeping at the error of their ways. But really, every brief spark, every fleeting romance, every one that got away is all part of the story; all part of the noxious, heady world that Luvcat is concocting. The way she walks, the way she talks, the way she stalks, the way she kisses… get it? Luvcat is Courtney Love with a Liza Minelli wink. She’s, in her own joking words, “Tom Waits in silk panties”. She’ll break your heart but throw hers on the line too. “Someone said to me, ‘All men are dogs’,” she chuckles. “But you’ve got to be careful of the cat…”

Meet The Team

Sarah Meyz is a producer, alternative pop artist, and harmonica player. Born and raised in Brazil, she grew up surrounded by music, having played tours around São Paulo, the Blue Note in New York, Blues festivals around the US, and the Lollapalooza festival in Brazil. With a double degree in Music Production & Engineering and Vocal Performance from Berklee College of Music, in Boston, where she was awarded a full tuition scholarship back in 2014, Sarah has worked with artists from all over the world, playing, producing, recording, and mixing. Her musicality and extensive artist experience has a deep influence in her production style. “Having been on both sides of the booth, it helps me to understand more of what an artist is going through when we’re in the studio. Music can be very personal and profound, full of emotions, memories, and nostalgia. It’s important that the artist feels comfortable in that moment, whatever comfortable means for them, and it’s up to me as a producer to build that creative and nourishing environment.” When it comes to her music, she says: “Harmonica synths, vocals, and a long drive through the roads of a dreamy, anxious, and feisty brain”. To Sarah, it’s about knowing the rules, so she can break the rules. “Being able to translate my knowledge across any, and all situations I encounter as a producer, artist, and engineer, is what really matters. From a bedroom recording with just a laptop, an interface, and a mic, to a professional studio with the most up to date equipment.”

In love with music from a very young age, Marta started playing classical guitar and then moved quickly to different instruments including electric bass, piano and singing driven by the curiosity of exploring sounds and creating music. Many years and musical projects later, she studied Electronic Music Production and Sound Engineering at Saint Louis College of Music in Rome, where she graduated with Honours in 2017. From here, she started working as live sound engineer while keeping in mind her passion for studio recording, mixing and music production. Following her interest in pursuing a career in a recording studio, Marta flew to London to study for a further year at Abbey Road Institute, where she graduated with Honours in 2019. After some time as a freelance sound engineer and producer, she joined the Abbey Road Studios team fascinated by the combination of orchestral recording and popular music. Whilst at the studios, she has worked on many projects including movie scores for Marvel, Disney and Netflix such as Black Widow, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore, The Matrix: Resurrections and Shang-Chi. She has also worked with artists including Joe Bonamassa, Nile Rodgers, Kaiser Chiefs, Bastille, Mabel, Hamzaa and Freya Ridings, as well as with composers such as Steven Price, Thomas Newman, Lorne Balfe, Ramin Djawadi and Alexandre Desplat.

Since 2013, Cicely has cemented her place as one of London’s top mastering engineers, working with a range of artists & genres across all formats, digital and vinyl. Last year she won the Music Producer’s Guild Mastering Engineer of the Year, having also been shortlisted in 2021. Starting her career at Gearbox Records, Cicely moved to AIR Studios in 2016 where she worked on remasters of David Bowie’s back catalogue and early releases from the saxophonist Nubya Garcia, as well as four albums from Ludovico Einaudi’s Seven Days Walking. Further vinyl mastering credits include Eric B. & Rakim, Usher, Simply Red, The Wedding Present and Porcupine Tree’s Closure/Continuation. At AIR, she also mastered many soundtracks for film & TV including Harry Escott’s BAFTA Award-winning score to Roadkill, Self Esteem’s score to the National Theatre’s Prima Facie production and Roger Goula’s All That Breathes, which won best documentary at Sundance and Cannes in 2022. Her recent highlights include Palace’s Shoals and Ultrasound, girli’s Matriarchy, Witch Fever’s Congregation, David Gray’s White Ladder Live, Soweto Kinch & The LSO’s White Juju, Max Richter’s Movement, Before All Flowers and In A Landscape, Tim Minchin & Chris Nightingale’s Matilda the Musical and many more. We’re proud to welcome Cicely to the Abbey Road family as she continues her work with some of the biggest names in music as well as up-and-coming artists like Witch Fever, Sarah Kinsley, Charlotte Plank and Charlieeeee.

Annie’s interest in music started at a young age when she began learning violin and piano. She quickly fell in love with playing and soon taught herself other instruments, experimenting with different genres and sounds along the way. As she honed her skills in a music production course as part of Kingston Music Service, she discovered a passion for recording and sound engineering that has become her focus ever since. While studying the Tonmeister course at the University of Surrey, she worked as a studio assistant for Anglo-Italian dub artist and producer Gaudi, engineering for artists including Don Letts and Alex Patterson and playing violin on some of their album tracks. Last year she landed herself a placement working at Abbey Road Studios and has since worked on sessions for renowned artists like Sam Ryder and on orchestral scores including Stephen Barton and Gordy Haab’s Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Alan Menken’s The Little Mermaid and Stephanie Economou’s Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken.

A Colombian-Italian passionate about music from a young age, Daniela completed her BA in Classical Piano Performance in Bogotá, Colombia at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana. There she taught piano and performed with minimalist group Ensamble Als Eco. Daniela then moved to London to study audio production at SAE Institute, with her final project being awarded a First-Class distinction: A 3D site-specific sound installation named Mismatched Milieux showcased at St. Ethelburga's Center for Peace and Reconciliation in London. During this time, she worked as an assistant engineer and then as an engineer at boutique studio Noatune Studios in Hackney on sessions with Biig Piig and Jords, amongst others. Next, Daniela joined us at Abbey Road Institute where she became a runner at Angel Studios, working with artists like Paolo Nutini and METTE. After receiving her diploma from Abbey Road Institute, Daniela worked as an assistant engineer on Dua Lipa's new album Radical Optimism for over a year, working with Kevin Parker, Danny L Harle, Andrew Wyatt, Ian Kirkpatrick and many incredible songwriters over at 5dB Media. Other notable credits from her time at 5dB include Los Bitchos, Georgia Cécile and Mackwood. We were thrilled to welcome Daniela to the Abbey Road team in early 2024, where she’s already had the chance to work as an assistant engineer for James Blake. Stay tuned for much more to come!