Yesterday, Spotify has officially announced the winners of this year’s Sound Up program.

Sound Up, returning for a second year, is Spotify’s five-day accelerator program designed to educate and support women of color in turning their creative ideas into fully developed podcasts.

Out of thousands of applicants, ten women were selected to participate in this year’s Sound Up. Last month, Spotify’s NYC office brought together a group of daily guest speakers, compelling workshops on storytelling, captivating lessons on music integration and a pitch competition. The week concluded with the judges’ final pick of winners who will receive support to develop and launch their pilot episodes, a new wave of exciting programming coming to Spotify.

This year, Christina Orlando, Janae Burris, Shayla Martin, and SK were honored with $10,000 each to fund their proposed podcasts:

• Christina is a non-binary, Latinx New Yorker working in publishing. Through the program, they’ve developed a time travel podcast concept that explores Queer history. Christina has worked to open up the conversation about pertinent issues of gender, race and mental health both in the LGBTQ+ community and beyond to galvanize the community, especially women of color
• Janae is a black stand-up comedian sharing how our relationships with our fathers, good, bad or non-existent is universal. Through her storytelling, she explores with those who have lost their fathers, how we operate in the world without them, and its effects on our mental and emotional health. Janae hails from Denver.
• Shayla is an Upper Marlboro local who developed her podcast exploring issues of addiction, recovery and maintaining sobriety through the lens of people of color
• SK is a South Asian immigrant, former attorney, and a sexual abuse/domestic violence survivor. Her story is chronicled in her podcast coming to Spotify

Sound Up marks one of Spotify’s hallmark programs designed to uplift women of color and amplify their voices. For more information on the Sound Up program, please visit HERE.