WOMEN WHO ROCK - Melinda Colaizzi

By: Lori Smerilson Carson

Women have always made significant contributions to society from Marie Curie, to Gloria Steinem, Katherine Johnson, Susan B. Anthony and Rosa Parks. Now, Melinda Colaizzi, Founder of WOMEN WHO ROCK is creating a global movement to empower female musicians, and to help advance the progress of women’s healthcare through research.

Catching up with Colaizzi in the Pittsburgh, PA area, she revealed some details about the organization, some past events, and what people can look forward to.

SFL Music Magazine: How did you start WOMEN WHO ROCK and what is your goal?

Melinda Colaizzi: I started WOMEN WHO ROCK about eight years ago, and I started it really from a very personal place of being a musician and working in the music industry myself and seeing firsthand just how underrepresented women both onstage and behind the scenes in the industry were and still are. Our dual mission is of course equality for both women in music and women’s health. I was touched by a women’s health issue. Research saved my mom’s life after she was diagnosed with cancer with about a five percent chance to live. She’s a survivor, sixteen years now because of medical research, and then it opened up my eyes just to how understudied and funded women’s health research is. Unfortunately, we’re going backwards. Our funding from the NIH is going down. It used to be about fourteen cents on the dollar. Now it’s about 4.8 cents on the dollar. So, I thought listen, if we could combine the power of music and the universal language it is and how music can heal, and do a benefit concert with an all-female fronted music lineup, wouldn’t that be incredible! We did it and here we are going into our ninth concert. It’s coming up on  October 17^th in Pittsburgh at Stage AE, but this has become so much more than just a benefit concert. It really has become a global movement, and it’s been quite the journey.

SFL Music Magazine: Do you have events in different states?

Colaizzi: Yes. That’s a great question. Our footprint is really expanding. So, this year we officially launched the WOMEN WHO ROCK foundation. Currently we are helping to expand that. That gives us more of a national fundraising footprint, so we are really asking our supporters to donate and are looking for some amazing supporters to help fund that so we can expand. I’m actually heading to Rock Limits right now to speak on a women’s panel and to have a WOMEN WHO ROCK pop up there. Yes, we want to take our message and our events all throughout the country. We also have an apparel company, and our merch is sold across the nation, and that’s really starting to expand. To me, when I started the merch, I wanted it to be like a wearable movement which it really has become an extension of what we do at WOMEN WHO ROCK.

SFL Music Magazine: Is the clothing by a certain designer?

Colaizzi: We are actually female founded, of course. We work with a lot of different designers. A lot of them are women of course, as you can imagine, but we work with a lot of different designers and have some really cool pieces. That part of our corporate giving, we also donate to support women’s health research. From the apparel alone, we’ve donated over ten thousand dollars to MAGEE-WOMENS RESEARCH INSTITUTE to support their incredible work.

SFL Music Magazine: Is Florida on your radar, hopefully?

Colaizzi: Actually, it is and you know, I love that you brought Florida up because there is a new guitar shop in Tampa opening up called LEGENDS (GUITARS), and we’re going to have some of our WOMEN WHO ROCK apparel for sale there. It’s a women owned guitar shop too!

SFL Music Magazine: I’ll have to check it out! Recently you had the Women in Metal: You Will Know My Name (exhibit) at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame with Lzzy Hale and Reign of Z. How did this come together?

Colaizzi: Yeah, that was an incredible event, and there was no better event for us to be part of then such an incredible celebration of women in metal. We’ve worked with the Hard Rock now for over a year. Two of our best-selling t-shirts are Support Women in Music t-shirt and our Rock Goddess t-shirt are available for sale in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame gift shop. So, it was a natural progression when they opened this exhibit that WOMEN WHO ROCK was part of it and we were proud to be part of it. We also have been partnered with Gibson Guitars for a couple years. So Lzzy is just somebody, I don’t know if you had a chance to see it, but she just released a new signature Epiphone guitar that is so bad ass. I actually had a chance to interview her a couple years ago too, but she’s someone we just admire, and her speech that night was just like everything that WOMEN WHO ROCK has been fighting for.

SFL Music Magazine: What events are coming up for people to look forward to?

Colaizzi: Definitely, our signature benefit concert. That is here in Pittsburgh on October 17^th at Stage AE. It’s presented by Gibson Gives which is the foundation arm of Gibson Guitars, and that night benefits MAGEE-WOMENS RESEARCH INSTITUTE. Magee is based here in Pittsburgh, but they are actually our nation’s first and largest research institute dedicated solely to women’s health. What’s so incredible is it really is every condition that effects women. From all of the women’s cancers to endometriosis, heart disease research, infertility. It’s such an incredible place that we’ve been partnered with for quite a while. Last year we raised over five hundred thousand dollars for Magee and their women’s health research. This year we want to raise even more. Malina Moye, one of the world’s best guitarists, she just released a new Kramer guitar with Gibson, but she’s actually the first women of color to have a Kramer signature model. We also have The Vindys. The iconic Taylor Dayne is headlining, and we also do a rising star contest during the concert. So, we just picked our rising star this Friday and this gives a young female singer/songwriter the opportunity to take that stage that night. We also, in partnership with The Vault Recording Studio, she goes into the studio and records a fully produced song with a six-time Grammy winning Producer Jimmy Hoyson. So, the night is just a really powerful night about again, our dual mission of supporting women in music and advancing women’s health.

SFL Music Magazine: What would you recommend for WOMEN WHO ROCK? What would you advise from your experiences?

Colaizzi: Be fearless and you have to believe in yourself because so many people in the industry won’t (she chuckled) and that’s not a reflection on you. So, I always tell women to believe in yourself all the way.

SFL Music Magazine: Is there anything you want to add?

Colaizzi: Our website is womenwhorock.info, so people can sign up and learn more about what we’re doing. Also, they can donate to the foundation that’s on the website as well and shop our rockin’ merch!