Lurleen Ladd: Link

Wavemakers: https://www.wavemakerswomen.com/

Transcripts:

Colleen: Welcome back to Hot Flashes and Cool Topics. Today, we are covering one of the cool

topics, which is women in music who are over the age of 40. And we are excited to

have Lurlene Ladd, who is the founder of Wavemakers on the show today.

Welcome.

Lurleen:  Thanks so much. Really glad to be here.

Colleen: It’s interesting because we were

contacted about what doing and it’s we love hearing about women who are working to

change the narrative for midlife and open opportunities and so can you touch a

little bit on what Wavemaker is and why you decided to create it?

Lurleen:  absolutely! It’s

Wavemakers because there’s more than just one of us.

Colleen:  that’s very true

Lureen:

So I came to music a little bit. I like to put some

air quotes because I don’t think it’s truly accurate, but I’m going to say late,

which means I was almost 40 when I started to write and perform music. And that

experience was enlightening, let’s just say, first to be somewhat of a beginner.

I mean, I had taken piano as a kid, you know, and that, I know a lot of people,

who were the same age as I was at the time. And there was not much of a roadmap

as to how to do that. I was highly competent in the other areas of my life.

I had started my career in social work, moved into health care administration, was

running businesses and nonprofits. And so I was sort of the lady that had the

answers, right? I had the clipboard. They used to joke about me being a kid. I

carried around a clipboard because apparently, I was into telling people what to do,

but I had to step into spaces where I absolutely knew the least of anyone in that

room. I was often the only woman in the room. That was very standard. So that

experience of trying to acquire skills and do well because, you know,

I felt like I also had high standards, which can kind of help and hurt you

sometimes when you’re a beginner at something. And so that experience for me really

opened my eyes. And I also thought, well, maybe this is just me because I’m coming

late to the table. And everybody else probably has all the answers. And over time,

I discovered that nothing could have been further from the truth, that a lot of

women in the industry felt like they too were isolated, fragmented, not connected

with their peers. My journey along the way to starting Wavemakers really kicked off

when I was releasing my second album. And I sort of felt like, you know,

starting to get the sense of I can’t be the only one who feels this way. And so

we did a nationwide search for some woman to open for the release of my second

album. And when I did that, we were flooded with women over 40,

which was really relevant to my experience. I didn’t know I was going to start a

company that was just about women over 40 in music. But I really wanted to hear

from women like, what’s it like? What’s it been like for you? Have you been at

this your whole life? Have you? Are you new to it? And we had a massive amount of

response of women sharing their stories around music. And it was clear that so often

music was what was at the center of their lives. It got them through divorce,

loss of a spouse, you know, job losses, bankruptcies, all these things. And they

kept coming back to music as the central core value for them. So once again,

you sort of get your horizons broaden now and again. It’s like, what am I really

seeing? And what I saw is a whole lot of women out there really doing what gave

them the most joy and feeling as though time was not on their side, feeling as

though they were getting pushed off stage. And there are many, there are myriad

reasons of why that is from sort of the industry perspective. But I also just

didn’t feel supported even sort of at the peer to peer level. So very long way of

explaining to you, I created Wavemakers because I wanted more women to feel

connected to each other in this industry. I also, my team is all about not sort of

let’s figure out how we can fit neatly into a ridiculously broken system. Like,

no, ex -nay on that. The music business doesn’t love women, experienced women.

You know, they kind of are very focused on sort of that prodigy talent and then,

you know, at a certain point, we just disappear because we’re not like 22 and a

size too. And so that’s kind of BS in my world. So I wanted to not only connect

women to each other, I wanted to connect them to economic opportunities for them to

continue their craft. And that means going around the existing system.

I am not interested in playing nice with a system that really doesn’t value women.

So we’re identifying economic opportunities and a way for women to connect with

brands and build their audience outside of the traditional path of the music

industry. That’s a lot. Yeah. There you go.

Bridgett: But I mean, that’s amazing to me that

you didn’t really get started with the music part of this. You certainly seem like

you really knew a lot about the business part of it. Are you, maybe not so much

in the music industry, but how to get things done. But the music part, I mean,

music, I mean, I am the world’s worst singer. I am.

But I love, I love music. I mean, it just is such a part of you if you’re trying to get

something done, music’s right there. I love it. I’m not good at it. But I think

that that’s so amazing.

Colleen: How did you decide that, hey this is something I really love.

 For the women out there that are set in a career like you and are successful

but they’ve always had this little whisper of a something else what would you say

to them.

Lureen:  right, well you know I had been so busy. So my husband’s a physician so I

was getting him through medical school, I was raising children, I was kind of come through his training and it there was

an opening and I think this is really important because I didn’t engineer that

opening there was just a moment of rest right before the next thing came

and um and I had a little bit of a you know of a crisis a little bit of

depression waltzed in because there was a transition point and I didn’t know what

came next and what came next surprised me because I had to get still for a minute

and that’s where this little voice like you talked about this sort of, I wonder

voice, like I always love to sing and I thought hey maybe I’ll just go take a

voice lesson like it was something that was so specifically for me it had nothing

to do with all of the tasks that I had and was like maybe just for me and so like

I followed that one little step, and then that this, everything came out of that one

moment because out of that voice lesson, a little while later, I literally just

started writing music. I know that sounds sort of crazy and fantastical, but

what it was is there was a gap that I didn’t quickly fill with a thousand tasks.

And I think my body was ready. And I had been on that,

you know, hamster wheel of next thing, next thing. Oh, when this happens, then it’s

going to be, then we’re really going to start. Then life’s really going to start.

And I had just, you know, had not really been paying attention to what I wanted.

And I know a lot of women,

it’s easy to fall into that trap. It’s not just a trap. I mean, life gets going

and it’s so freaking busy that it’s, it’s really hard to zero in on that. But I

will say,  life gave me a bit of a space and it

jumped forward. I could have ignored that. I could have been like yeah whatever

and believe me there was many a day of I was like “yeah today I’m a singer

-songwriter, tomorrow I’m going to be an astronaut and then a ballerina. I mean like I

didn’t say much to anybody around me that I was doing this because I thought they

would think I was crazy yeah for sure so the self -doubt is an

understandable part of that process.

Bridgett: Right. I think a lot of people don’t share that

because they are worried about the naysayers. Maybe they don’t share what they’re

going to do because they’re like, I know they’re going to tell me I’m crazy. But I

want to try this. And sometimes you just keep quiet about it. But when was that

moment where you like, okay, we’re going to get together. I need other women.

Lurleen: Right, so I did something crazy,

I recorded three songs and ran to Nashville. Okay, so I don’t suggest that

as a plan. But it was sort of a, you know, that’s kind of me like rush headlong

into something. But I actually got some pretty good feedback when I was in Nashville

from publishers. So it gave me a little bit of grounding to kind of come out and

say, hey, I do this. But for years and years, when I would introduce myself at a

party, hi, I’m Lurlene, and I would say that I was this business woman. Oh, and by

the way, I do this other thing on the side, this music thing on the side. Now,

that is me doing that. Nobody did that to me. I did that to myself. And with the

release of that second album, I just said, you know, I’m going to quit that. Now

when people ask, what do you do, who are you? I start first by saying I’m a

musician. I’m a singer -songwriter. I thought maybe somebody would, someday somebody

would come along and put a crown on my head and say, okay, now you can say the

thing that you really love to do and that you are. No, that was me and I had to

do that before anybody else would.

Colleen:  I understand exactly what you’re

Saying.  Women feeling like, do they have permission to do that? Do they have

permission to show up with aspirations.

Lurleen:  I often say that,

you know, if you and I were sitting here and talking about an eight -year -old who

was taking cello lessons and you and I were going to go to the recital and she’s

up there doing the best she can at eight on that cello, we know that she’s in a

learning curve. And so we extend a lot of grace there, right? Oh, she’s doing great

and she’s better than she was and she’s going to be great, you know, at this. We

don’t extend that same perspective, I don’t think to adult learners the way we

should. Because it’s okay to be a learner.

We somehow think that adults don’t have tolerance anymore for learning. And it is

uncomfy. But we do have tolerance for that. And we also,

I think, often look at women over 40 and don’t see potential. We see what you did.

Like, what did you do for, you know, your career or, you know, where, as opposed

to, where are you headed? Because when we talk about that, we’re talking about what

do you care about and value so much that that’s what’s ahead of you? And,

yeah, when it feels like the potential isn’t there, I know it needs a reframe.

Colleen: When we talk to women who are over 40, over 50, over 60, their definition of

success is very different than their definition was in their 20s and 30s. How has

that played a role in this new career for you?

Lurleen: Well, I had an epiphany of late, which was if I had had the skill that I have now

vocally and on stage and I’d had it at 22, I can say without doubt based on the

on, I have a lot of respect for that girl at 22 that young woman at 22.

It would have been an unprecedented disaster because I didn’t know who I was.

I assure you with all the awareness we have about the dangers within this

industry, I would have been that young woman at the wrong place, at the wrong time,

in the wrong room.

So definition of success for me now is really showing up,

and I, you know, that word authentic, I know gets bandied about, but to be on

stage is to perform and render that song in a way I feel like I did it well. I showed up as myself and that came through and connected for

the audience. That’s very important to me and something I work on all the time.

There was a time when I had a tremendous amount of stage fright and it absolutely

ran my life and ran the show, which was funny because I was

actually on the radio, my husband and I had a call -in show every Sunday

morning for eight years in Austin and so being in front of people or if you

threw me up there to talk to a bunch of people I was okay I mean everybody gets

a little nervous but it was within manageable terms but to get up there and saying

wow I really had to confront what it meant, why that felt so frightening because

hey, you’re vulnerable up there. I mean, even on a podcast you are. I mean,

everybody’s watching, right?

So I had to first really come to terms with why I was so afraid up there on

stage. And it was, I mean, it was very much a safety issue and wanting to feel

safe on stage so that you’re kind of out of survival mode and you can show up and

do more than just get up there and breathe. I also don’t recommend anybody singing

without breathing. It’s really ill -advised. You have to be able to breathe.

But I had a great voice coach who actually worked with me over time to a lot of

that. And people who struggle with public speaking of any kind or on stage for any

reason, it’s really about the nervous system has to kind of calibrate a little bit.

And so she had a great thing. She had something called Sing Club. And that’s where

we would all show up and they would be an accompanist. And you would get up there

and sing a couple of songs. The stakes were low. There wasn’t an audience full of,

you know, 30 people that you didn’t know. They were friends. They were all doing

the same thing you were doing.

And so she tried to get me to do that class for like a year or two. And I would

always be like, oh, I’m coming. I’m coming. And then at the last second, I

would cancel. Just cancel. And so finally, one time she said it and I go, you know

what, I’m not just going to attend it. I’m going to host it at my house. And so

I left myself nowhere to run. And so I hosted that thing for almost two years,

a year and a half or so. And that’s really where the dragon was slayed.

That was where it happened was, again, the stakes have to be high enough that

you’re activated, but you know,

You know, that really was a big piece to that. Now working to connect women with

each other and this bigger mission around really women’s voices over 40.

So obviously, Wavemakers’ work was started around supporting women in music 40 plus.

But as we started, we discovered that really any woman 40 plus we like to say

there’s nothing more dangerous than a woman 40 plus who owns her own voice now for

the musician that means she’s standing on stage and doing what she loves but for

women any woman over 40 we are all about her lifting her voice and standing in

that space we all deserve that regardless of if it’s you know I always say the

world would be a better place with more happy and fulfilled women. And for me,

women over 40, it’s just what I care about the very most. So Wavemakers is about

empowering women 40 plus across the board with some specific help to those artists

within the music industry where we can really give them tactical help for the

musicians.

Colleen:  And you know, so many women, as we age, we start to care less about

what other people think. And do you think that that was helpful also with Wavemakers

to find these women 40 plus and let that go?

Lurleen: Yeah. Well, and you know, women are often, it’s insidious this sort of sense of, am

I measuring up? How does it all? How do I look? How do I look? When we did the

Sing Out Loud challenge, when I asked the women to submit their stories, I also

asked them to please put a performance video and attach it. And I got these

responses, which more than one, I’m going to say a handful that were like, well, I

would go ahead and send the video in if I could just lose 10 pounds. And I was

like, oh, God, no, that’s not what we’re doing here.

It is, okay, so I often say, look, at some point when you’re on stage, it’s that

your age is going to have to be a feature and not a bug. We have to, I know

that’s kind of an ism, but truly, And having experience is that’s what that looks

like. That means you will not look like you did when you were 22. I often say I

didn’t sign a piece of paper that said I was always supposed to look like that.

I’m not obligated. There’s no contract in place. But I am very sensitive to it.

And when you get 10 or 15 women 40 plus in a room, musicians or not, the beauty

standard, the sexist standard that’s out there. It’s in the room. It’s the 800-pound

gorilla. And it is a series of tricks, I think, because I also think when I talked

about stage fright, I was like, oh, my God, if I’m up there performing, they’re

going to see how old I am, and that I’m not, like, tiny. Like, I mean,

literally, of all the things to be thinking about, that’s what I think all those

people in the audience are going, wow, you know, look at her. She really, she’s

such a disappointment up there, man. Like, if only she, what size are those

jeans she’s wearing? You know, I mean, like, we, it’s just so insidious that it

gets in the way. And so when we talk to women, I’m always like, it’s impossible to

shut it off, but if we can just turn the volume down, just a bit, you know, on

that stuff. You, you have to sort of say, I’m going to put this much into it,

into the hair, into the whatever, and then I’m going. Because otherwise,

care regimen is. I’m in the wrong place. So anyway, I get a little rantey about

that. Sorry.

 Yeah. It kind of goes across the board of every

professional career.

Colleen: Right. Women have such internalized self -dialogue to criticize

themselves and speak about themselves in a way that they would not speak about

anybody else that they care about. And it’s just ingrained in us. So it goes across

the board in every career. Are, you know, am I listened to in the boardroom? Am I

still having value in this career? And unfortunately, it happens, but with things like

wave, change, uh, we try that. And I have like a, some kind of pseudo problem

with, with Wavemakers, but with companies like Wavemakers making a difference,

that narrative is changing.

Colleen: So what has the response been since you’ve started it?

Lurleen: Yeah, so that’s been exciting. So we again started with this Sing Out Loud challenge

where people, women send in their stories. And then we formalized all of this in

2023 and opened up a grant to women 40 plus in the music industry. So we,

we cleverly named it because we’re a bunch of songwriters, five for five and 25.

So we open to grant out. It was really for women in central Texas. And we,

again, amazing response from all these women in music. And we couldn’t pick five. So

we picked six. It doesn’t rhyme, but we still managed to get through. So we did six

women at $5 ,000 each for grants. And then we did an additional five at $1 ,000. So

the response from the grant was huge. And, you know, that’s sort of in the data,

right? We also submitted, requested women to sign up as members and to complete a

survey because we really want to gauge their experience. You know, if you’re going

to try to solve the problem for God’s sakes, please ask them what they think the

problem is. This is key, but many times in organizations, and even some for women,

we seem to miss the basic thing of what do we ask them what they need. You know,

it’s a great place to start.

But out of that, the response from the community within the music community was very

strong. Oh my gosh, yes, please. Like, there are other grants in the city of Austin

and, you know, NIA grants and that sort of thing. And I specifically said, and you

know, you can shoot me for it. I said, I don’t want these women, these 40 plus

women, I don’t want them competing against somebody who’s 22. I don’t want it. And

because I started the organization, I can do that. And so I really wanted these

dollars focused at these women specifically. Making music these days is incredibly

expensive. If you don’t know that and your listeners don’t know, it just is. And we

believe in the ethical treatment of all of these other musicians. So that means if

you are paying somebody to play guitar for you or you’re paying a drummer or

something, you have to pay these people well. This sort of this idea that we’re all

doing this for exposure is part of this, that artist, starving artist trope. And

professionals are paid for their services. And so a professional woman who is

creating music, there’s just hard costs. There’s expenses to that. So, getting the

money into those women’s hands was key. They know what to do with it, by the way.

They don’t need a lot of parameters on that. So, the response to the grant was

huge and within the industry, lots of nodding heads. Yes, you keep doing that. But what

I found particularly touching, again, were the people’s response outside of music?

Because they were like, yeah, these women shouldn’t be forced off stage. Some of the

women that I admire the most are over 40, or I didn’t know she was over 40. So

it was good to see from a community side that people felt like these women deserve

a chance to continue their craft. And I also felt like, you know,

like Bridgett asked, like about those women who might have been like me who were

like, oh, maybe there’s still time for me. You know, that to me was super important

that that was made available to them.

So the response has been great. And I also think from the musicians themselves,

some of really special moments have been just one walking up to me saying, I can’t

thank you enough. I just don’t feel like I’m seen anymore. Like, thank you for

seeing me as a person and a value. And I mean, I was just kind of knocked out by

that a little bit because it felt so novel. The way she said that was like, thank

you for seeing me because I feel like I’m disappearing here. And I know a lot of

women can relate to that sense outside of music. And so the idea to provide sort

of a container for that, a place that women can show up and be seen and validated,

their experience valued, you know, like I can’t imagine telling,

you know, an attorney or an accountant, oh, you’ve been doing something for 20

years, you should really set out the next 20. We’re done with you. Because acumen

in business, right? And in almost anywhere, is valued as, you know, sort of time.

You know, hey, you’re getting better at that. But when it comes to women in media

and music, entertainment and the like in many other areas, it’s like, yeah, you hit

a certain point and adios. And so that response that I’ve gotten repeatedly tells us

that we’re on the right path, which you always like to feel like you’re

 going about things the right way.

Bridgett: How do you fundraise for these grants

or how do you get the money to award these grants?

Lurleen:  Right. And so when we first

started, we had some private dollars that we were using from women that were very

dedicated and concerned to this as a cause around music. Where we go now is

starting to work with brands that understand and value their relationship with that

40 plus demographic of women, right? And we know, I know the three of us probably

know quite well, that women 40 plus make the majority of the purchasing decisions in

the United States. So, you know, ignoring us would be at their peril. So we’re

looking for brands to connect with that really understand this demographic and want

that group of consumers, if you will, to feel seen within their brand,

just the way women feel seen within Wavemakers. And so the funding for our future

work will be coming from brands. We’ve established some partnerships in Austin, and

we’ll really be kicking that off into 2026. So, and that’s part and parcel also of

the opportunities. So what we see happening is,

so like our grantees from last year, working with brands is a way to help develop

an audience that, again, goes around the existing process, which would be like if

you guys wrote a couple songs and put them out on Spotify, it’s hard, even though

that’s the path you go for distribution that would be most understandable, right?

I think at this point, I can’t remember what the latest stat is. It’s something

like, I don’t know, 500 ,000 streams just to have sort of gotten to a minimum wage.

So streaming and the way the industry is organized right now is not really self

-sustaining. So we are looking for opportunities for our female artists to connect and

build audience by pairing up with a brand. And that is the innovative way around.

So that makes sense.

Colleen:  it’s a smart business model because

if you had told us that model, when we started six years ago, we would have said

good luck to you. But there’s so many companies now in the last three or four

years that are starting to realize the power behind this demographic and that the

money is there.  So I think that that’s a very smart way to go forward

in connecting brands, whether they’re doing, I mean, I don’t even know if they use

the term jingles anymore. Do they use the term jingles anymore? But, you know, for

commercials and promotion and to do music spots, and there’s so many different

avenues that you could work that within. How has the response been from

the brands?

Lureen:  it’s been exciting. So we, we’ve worked with Austin Woman, which is a

magazine and experience bigger than just a magazine, more of a big media company

here in Austin. And they’ve been doing business awards for years. And I’ve been a

part of that in the past on the business side. And this year, we did something

they’d never done before. So, you know, you guys have been to conferences where you

walk on stage and you walk off. Well, they were using canned music, probably. I’m

sure they were using Who Rules the World by Beyonce, which we love that. But the

problem is that you don’t get those licenses cleared. You can’t do anything with

that online because it’ll get pulled down. So Wavemakers went in and soundscaped that

entire event. And it was all original music by Austin artists that were accompanying

the women walking on and off the stage. That had never been done before. And not

only that, those women were paid for the licensing of their work. We also had one

of our artists opened the event. So in a simple way, just conferences,

right? A woman’s conference should have original music created by Wavemakers. Any

conference out there, we’re down to do that. So soundscaping like that is something

that’s so simple, but people don’t realize the power that’s in that. We also then

had a playlist that was given to all the attendees, and so they took that music

with them. Those are simple ways, and obviously, like you said, a jingle, of course,

and we do custom music for brands as well. So a lot of times, I think we think

about like Nike, of course, they have some ginormous budget for music and integrated

campaigns. But when you think about a small to medium -sized business, it may seem

extremely daunting. Like, I wouldn’t even know where to start. And that’s one of the

things that on the business side of Wavemakers, we make very easy for small to

medium -sized businesses to integrate music into their marketing and in their general

business plan. We have a deep bench of people that have that in their background on

the PR marketing side to facilitate that and provide those opportunities.

Bridgett: And,

you know, being in Austin also, my daughter lives there. So I know ACL was in

Austin Simmons? Then you also have South by

Southwest there. Are you all involved in either of those in any way?

Lurleen: We did a

slight activation last year. We’ll be doing more this year. Unfortunately, well, we’ll

start with South By, since that is a huge industry, you know, everybody comes

together on the film side as well as music and tech big time. So they’re shifting

a little bit, and so shifting a little bit away from music this next spring,

which was, you know, we were all a little bit like, ah,

But we will actually have some pretty big announcements to come South

By this time this

year. We’re announcing some big brand partnerships I can’t talk about yet. But we’re

definitely doing that during South By simply because you sort of pull all of these industries together on media and I think

it’s the right time for us. ACL

is a, that is a huge, as your daughter knows well. And we would love to see,

because I can put this out here on my wish list, I would love to see in a future

ACL, a Wavemaker Stage where we really are focusing on those artists 40 plus.

That’s on my wish list. I think that would be great.

Colleen:  what is your dream for wavemakers?

You know, I know locally, you’re in

the Austin, you’ve done some things in Texas, what would you like to see happen for

wave makers?

Lurleen: I would like to see this as more of a social movement where we have many,

many women 40 -plus part of the Wavemakers circle, where they are able to connect

in a place for them to feel safe and seen. and we will always be servicing those

artists on the on the industry music side that we’re going to do. But I would like

any woman over 40 to feel like if she’s a member of Wavemakers that she feels

that’s a place that she can show up as herself. And, you know, if music is her

passion, we have a way to help her with that. If it’s throwing pots or she wants

to be, you know, the CEO of her own company, that she finds support for those

endeavors.

I want women to feel like now is the time and that they don’t need to put off

what they are figuring out matters most to them.

That’s what I talk about. The world needs more women who are happy and fulfilled

now at 40. And it’s such a critical time. It’s when everything, like I that in my

life, there was a moment where it opened, and then this kind of came in.

There were probably times earlier than that, it was sort of kind of going, hey,

maybe you ought to pay attention to this. I don’t want them to wait. And I don’t

want them to be 65, 70, and be like, oh, man, I should have. I really want

Wavemakers to be a place where now is the time and you show up there and you feel

supported. So We will be expanding beyond Texas this year. For the next grant cycle,

we open to any woman in the United States. So we’re ready for that and ready to

support those women throughout, whether they’re in, you know, Idaho or Missouri or

wherever we’re ready for that. And getting one year under our belt was super

important. So that’s where we go next is to be on the United States. And then

certainly any woman over 40 anywhere that wants to connect, We want.

Colleen: And we thank you so much, Lurleen, for coming on the show and for doing this. And

we look forward to watching you grow with it with Wavemakers.

Lurleen: Thank you so much.

Thank you, both. It was a joy talking to you. And yes, I’ll keep you up to date

and would love to talk to you again.