It always surprises me that there aren't more persons of the female persuasion engaged in recording their music. A couple of decades ago, the charts were dominated by male singers, with the odd notable exception, but female singers and musicians are now far more prevalent than they were, even in the previously male-dominated areas of hard rock and heavy metal. But walk into any studio, and 99 times out of 100, you'll find male engineers and male record producers. The same seems to be true of home recording, though the women who do get involved tend to be very good at it.

If the modern view that women can do most jobs as well as their male counterparts is to be accepted, then why is this? At the risk of sounding sexist, I don't believe that, overall, men and women do have equal abilities. To make a computing analogy, I feel that women are far more adept at multitasking jobs than men while, in the main, men appear to do a better job of concentrating all their mental effort on a single task. I know this is a gross generalisation, but it's certainly true of the people around me, both at home and at work. Take Debbie, our production editor, for example; she can happily do three or four jobs at once with regular interruptions and she never seems to lose track of anything. I, on the other hand, can be working on some technical article and I get in so deep that I don't hear people speaking to me (even when they shout), I don't really know where I am, and when someone rings to ask which issue we're working on, I have to ask Debbie what month it is. If someone interrupts me, instead of going back to work on the article, I'll probably forget all about it and start another one, only to rediscover the first one while tidying up my hard disk!

To be a successful recording engineer, you have, above all, to be good at multitasking. You have to be aware of signal levels, you have to remember what you've patched where, and you need to constantly monitor what you're recording and onto what track. Complicated drop-ins are even worse, especially when someone is trying to hold a conversation with you at the same time. There are literally dozens of variables that have to be accommodated, and if even one small thing goes wrong, it's all your fault.

Taken individually, none of the tasks, concepts or operations is in any way difficult, but keeping track of a hectic session requires a considerable degree of mental organisation. When the majority of the women I've come across possess this ability already, how come it isn't male studio engineers that are in the minority? Don't ask me, I've got enough to think about!