In the "Jazz Age", women took a greater part in the workforce after the end of the First World War, giving them more independence.
In the Jazz Age and during the 1930s, "all-girl" bands such as the Blue Belles, the Parisian Redheads (later the Bricktops), Lil-Hardin's All-Girl Band, the Ingenues, the Harlem Playgirls led by the likes of Neliska Ann Briscoe and Eddie Crump, the International Sweethearts of Rhythm, Phil Spitalny's Musical Sweethearts, "Helen Lewis and Her All-Girl Jazz Syncopators" as well as "Helen Lewis and her Rhythm Queens [1][2] were popular.
She also co-wrote several jazz standards with Jimmy McHugh, including "Exactly Like You", "On the Sunny Side of the Street" and "I Can't Give You Anything but Love, Baby".
[8] While Billie Holiday is best known as a singer, she co-wrote "God Bless the Child" and "Don't Explain" with Arthur Herzog, Jr. and she penned the blues song "Fine and Mellow".
[8] Besides earlier singers such as Miriam Makeba or Dorothy Masuka, women in contemporary South African jazz include trombone player Siya Makuzeni, pianist and vocalist Thandi Ntuli, or pianists Lindi Ngonelo and Lindi Ngonelo.
Nina Simone was hailed as setting a prominent precedent for other artists, as she modeled what was called the new style of jazz.
[10] Although it was an all-white audience, many of those listening responded with interest and concern rather than criticism, which added another layer to the culture of jazz within the civil rights era.
Jazz became a unifying concept among contrasting races and cultures and Simone’s popular anthems continued to be a product of the issues surrounding the Civil Rights Movement and the injustices that were displayed.
[11] Billie Holiday was another prominent female jazz singer who provided an effective notion to the Civil Rights Movement in her song "Strange Fruit".
[12] Through an emotional and metaphorical narration, Holiday's song depicts the vision and harsh reality of blacks being lynched as a result of racism.
According to Jessica Duchen, a music writer for London newspaper The Independent, women musicians are "too often judged for their appearances, rather than their talent", and they face pressure "to look sexy onstage and in photos.
In the mid-19th century, notable women songwriters emerged, including Faustina Hasse Hodges, Susan McFarland Parkhurst, Augusta Browne and Marion Dix Sullivan.