NPR

Instrument Makers Learn A Long-Overdue Lesson: It Isn't Just Men Playing Guitar

As outdated assumptions about the market for instruments come to light, some guitar makers are finally starting to recognize that players come in all shapes, sizes and genders.
Sadie Dupuis of Speedy Ortiz performs in Birmingham, Ala. in September.

When Sadie Dupuis, the lead singer and songwriter of Speedy Ortiz, started playing guitar in her early teens, she didn't think of herself as a "female" guitarist — at least at first.

"I knew that I was the only girl in my high school who played. But it wasn't until I started touring as an adult and seeing how few women were on bills that it started to really matter to me that I was a woman who could play technically challenging parts," Dupuis says.

On the band's current

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