Beatport has teamed up with Toolroom Academy and LabelRadar to launch a new demo competition as part of Toolroom’s ongoing #WeAreListening initiative, a platform dedicated to discovering and developing female-identifying talent in electronic music.

Originally launched in 2018, #WeAreListening was created after Toolroom noticed a striking imbalance in its demo submissions. While the label receives thousands of demos each week, only a small fraction came from women. A call for submissions around International Women’s Day quickly proved that there was far more talent waiting to be heard, prompting Toolroom to evolve the idea into a wider mentoring platform, event series, and education program through Toolroom Academy. The UK-based label also hosted in-house production and mentoring sessions, inviting aspiring artists into its headquarters for full days of educational programming, alongside guest speakers such as Hannah Wants to inspire and educate.

Since then, the initiative has helped uncover rising artists including ESSEL, who has gone on to score multiple Beatport No.1s, rack up over 100 million streams, and build an international touring career.

This year, Toolroom hosted its first #WeAreListening writing camp, inviting artists from across the UK and Europe. This week saw the first releases from the camp land, including “Funky Operator” by Nausica (Toolroom) and Carly Wilford’s “Chemistry” (Toolroom Trax). Listen below.

Now, to celebrate International Women’s Day, Toolroom, Beatport, and LabelRadar are inviting aspiring female-identifying producers to submit one demo for a chance to win a year-long scholarship to Toolroom Academy, including production courses, artist development, and mentorship.

Submissions are open now via LabelRadar, with the winner set to be announced March 20.

Submit Your Demo Here!

• Submit one demo maximum
• This competition is only open to female identifying producers
• Deadline: Friday, March 20

Good luck!