By McKell Park and Andrea Zapata
Former group members of BYU Noteworthy claim they faced major differences in treatment from Performing Arts, BYU Music Group and the university when it came to scholarships, promotion, budget and touring opportunities.
Several former Noteworthy members, including previous director Amy Whitcomb, said they were not given fair performance opportunities compared to other performing arts groups, and said they were left with unanswered questions about funding and often felt overlooked.
BYU student Esther Yoder started the all-female a cappella group in 2003. According to Whitcomb, the group was run entirely by students and members would scramble to find practice rooms late at night and hope to not get kicked out. BYU officially adopted the group in 2014 under BYU Performing Arts Management.
Vocal Point, BYU’s all-male a capella group, had similar beginnings. BYU students Dave Boyce and Bob Ahlander founded the group in 1991 and BYU officially adopted it just three years later in 1994.
Although Vocal Point has been around 10 years longer than Noteworthy, Amy Whitcomb, Noteworthy director from 2018 to 2021, said the groups are often compared to one another because both have nine group members and perform similar music styles. She also claims funding, promotion and resources were far from equal during her time working with Noteworthy.
“I feel like I was gaslit basically the entire time I was there,” Whitcomb said.
According to Vocal Point director McKay Crockett, the major funding differences stem from Vocal Point’s large alumni pool who donate to the group, as well as higher profits from released music and performances.
“In general terms, Vocal Point and Noteworthy are set up identically in the way they’re funded,” Crockett said. “We don’t receive any university funding, the only way the groups receive money is by performing.”
Whitcomb said the explanation for funding and promotion differences based on the narrative that Vocal Point had been around longer, made more money and had a larger following made sense to her at the time. As the years went on however, she said she realized there was little effort to change the differences in scholarships, promotion, budget and touring opportunities.
“We were really babies compared to them,” Whitcomb said. “We don’t have the same years, we don’t have the same amount of alumni, we haven’t had the same exposure, but there hasn’t been really any real effort to give us the same full opportunity and resource to even gain that kind of following.”
Five current and former Noteworthy and Vocal Point members who were contacted by The Daily Universe declined to comment and said they were uncomfortable answering The Daily Universe’s questions.
“We love members of Vocal Point — we literally love them. We do recognize that it is management who is causing these inequalities,” said Brittan Wawro McMillan, a Noteworthy member from 2019-2022. “We love Vocal Point and this is not a fight against them at all.”
A Title IX issue
For 10 years after Yoder started Noteworthy, group members tried to convince the university to adopt them, according to Whitcomb. During that time, Vocal Point remained the sole single-gender a cappella group under BYU and Performing Arts Management, having been adopted by them only three years after their founding.
“It wasn’t until two Noteworthy alumni went to Title IX in 2014, that BYU accepted us under their wing,” Whitcomb said. “Vocal Point will always have 15 years on us.”
Tatiana Quinn, one of the two Noteworthy alumni who worked through the process of having Performing Arts Management adopt the a cappella group, explained hers was never a battle about gender equality.
“BYU School of Music didn’t want another contemporary-style group, another group similar to Vocal Point, and the reason why Noteworthy wasn’t under their wing wasn’t gender, it was because BYU had different musical preferences,” Quinn said.
Quinn, who is also a co-chair in the Noteworthy alumni chapter, said in 2014, Noteworthy alumna Sara Phelps felt the spiritual prompting to try to meet with people to work toward having BYU adopt Noteworthy, but the School of Music kept telling them ‘no.’
However, Quinn and Phelps decided to move on with the process anyway.
“Then this alumna (Phelps) filed a complaint to Title IX and after meeting with them and explaining the situation, I ended up meeting with BYU’s vice president at the time and Performing Arts Management,” Quinn said. “Shortly after that, there was a memorandum of understanding that was drawn up and there was an arrangement between Noteworthy, Vocal Point, BYU School of Music, Performing Arts Management, the College of Fine Arts and Communications and the university about having Noteworthy join them.”
Title IX states that “no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”
BYU’s Title IX coordinator Tiffany Turley Bowcut said BYU receives federal financial assistance and therefore is subject to Title IX and work to ensure the university is compliant. She also said that a cappella singing groups like Vocal Point and Noteworthy are considered a program or activity of the university, so there needs to be equity between the sexes.
“There is no statute or policy necessarily that made it so Noteworthy became part of Performing Arts Management, but rather the university, in evaluating equity between the two sex-based groups and in keeping with the Title IX statute above, determined this should be the case,” Turley Bowcut said.
According to Quinn, the reason Noteworthy was constantly denied joining Performing Arts Management had to do with the School of Music’s musical preferences. The Daily Universe contacted the BYU School of Music to get confirmation on this claim, but was referred to Performing Arts Management.
“Although I do not believe that the BYU School of Music’s denial of Noteworthy’s several requests to join it had to do with gender, and although Title IX is a unique law that the School of Music likely and understandably did not fully understand, I believe that they should have still known about Title IX,” Quinn said. “They should have recognized there was an inequality in their music program which needed to be addressed.”
When asked about Title IX compliance, Performing Arts Management assistant director Karson Denney said he is in regular communication with the Title IX office to make sure they are in full compliance with it.
Scholarships
Another challenge former Noteworthy members said they faced was regarding scholarships — or the lack thereof.
According to Wawro McMillan, in an a cappella Q&A that took place in 2019 and involved members of Vocal Point and Noteworthy, a member from the audience asked the artists if they received tuition scholarships for being part of a performing group that represented the university.
Wawro McMillan explained they did not receive any tuition scholarships. However, a Vocal Point member present at the panel, answered that in fact, the all-male a cappella group did.
“Both groups can receive scholarships,” Denney said. “Scholarships either come from alumni-generated scholarships or there could be a possibility of donors that have donated specific scholarships. Vocal Point does have a head start, they have a much more active alumni group that donates to them. They have some alumni scholarships that I believe are awarded a lot more often than Noteworthy alumni scholarships.”
Both groups also have replenishment grants, where donors can give funds that go toward the group’s scholarships. According to Vocal Point director McKay Crockett, these funds are allocated based on the donors’ preferences.
“Vocal Point began an internal effort to raise scholarship money with our alumni base around 20 years ago. Around 8 years ago the first partial tuition scholarship was awarded to one student in the group,” Crockett said. “Because of the kindness of Vocal Point alumni and many other donors who have specifically chosen to donate to Vocal Point, there are scholarship opportunities for students today.”
According to Denney, money coming from outside donors who are not Vocal Point or Noteworthy alumni, would need to be split between the two groups to be in compliance with Title IX.
“Last year there was a donor that gave scholarships to Vocal Point and we were told that because of Title IX, that money would have to be shared with Noteworthy,” Denney said. “As a result, this money went toward scholarships for members of both groups.”
According to Denney, BYU lost out on some large donations because Performing Arts Management insisted on this standard of equity.
In Winter Semester 2022, after the donation had been made, Noteworthy members received full tuition scholarships for that semester. However, Wawro McMillan and Whitcomb questioned whether that had been the first occasion money from an outside donor should have been split between the two groups.
“In any other donations that come in moving forward in that type of scenario, it has to be split,” Denney said.
On a different occasion, as Noteworthy prepared to compete in The Varsity Vocals International Championship of Collegiate A Cappella in 2022, Whitcomb was no longer the Noteworthy director, but she was volunteering with the group to coach them in preparation for the competition.
Whitcomb said the group was told there was not enough funding for their travel and other expenses because the group booked the competition on their own and not through Performing Arts Management.
Whitcomb and the alumni committee began brainstorming ways to raise the funds because the women were passionate about competing in the competition. Wawro McMillan said Denney told the group that any funds raised or donations from alumni would need to be split evenly between Noteworthy and Vocal Point because of Title IX.
However, according to Wawro McMillan, the information coming from Performing Arts Management was incorrect and the group didn’t end up having to split the funds they raised.
“Noteworthy did travel to the ICCA’s in 2022 and while I did work with LDS philanthropies to secure over $12,000 in donations for them to be able to attend, that money was not split with Vocal Point,” Denney said. “Noteworthy alumni also raised around $2,500 to help support the students which was given to the students as scholarship money to cover expenses they were in charge of.”
Differences in budget
Unlike BYU’s choir or dance groups, which receive an allotment of funds every year from the School of Music and the Dance Department respectively, Vocal Point and Noteworthy are entirely self-funded. Funds for operations and other expenses are brought in by profits made from live performances.
In their contracts, members of Noteworthy were required to “wear the prescribed uniform in the appropriate manner” when on tour or performing in local performances. Mertz, Noteworthy member from 2020 to 2022, said Noteworthy group members had to pay for those travel uniforms out of pocket if the cost was above the budgeted amount.
Wawro McMillan explained their budget changes depending on the year based on how much money the group made. However, she also said that during her time in Noteworthy, the a cappella group tended to have a $150 budget per academic year to spend on clothes and uniforms.
She told The Daily Universe about an occasion when she saw her husband, a former member of Vocal Point, spend around $900 on shoes for all of the a cappella group members. Mertz claimed Vocal Point members got at least three travel uniforms plus Nike gear for free.
The Daily Universe attempted to confirm this information but did not receive a response.
“It was kind of hard because we were ordering leggings and T-shirts from Shein — like we were trying to find the cheapest stuff possible because they wanted us to have a uniformed look,” Mertz said. “We would get in trouble if we weren’t in these travel uniforms, but it was also harder for us to get those travel uniforms.”
Wawro McMillan said with a $150 budget, they could not possibly purchase enough outfits for a week long tour.
“With that money, maybe we can get a single outfit, but Performing Arts Management expects us to wear the uniforms all the time, and we don’t have enough clothes to wear during a one week long tour,” she said.
She also said she witnessed multiple purchases Vocal Point made and realized “it wasn’t even close to what Noteworthy was spending.”
According to Mertz, Noteworthy members were later paid back for the uniforms after they requested reimbursement from Performing Arts Management.
Lizzy Newbold, Noteworthy member from 2018-2021, said the women were often left in the dark when it came to funding differences but were assured by the director of BYU Performing Arts Management, Shane Wright, and the assistant director, Karson Denney, the distribution of funds was equal based on the monetary amount each group was producing.
“Vocal Point does get more requests for gigs and they end up booking more gigs. Because of this, they’re able to make more money to spend on some of these types of things such as performing attire and travel attire,” Denney said.
Crockett also said all their operations are covered by the money they receive from doing performances and he believes Noteworthy’s financial model is set up identically to Vocal Point’s.
“I fell for the narrative that ‘We don’t make as much money,’ but it’s not fair because we don’t have the same opportunities,” Whitcomb said.
Denney said both groups have the same opportunities to make money though videos, streaming and gigs.
“They both have the same opportunity to be requested, they’re both up on our website, we have the same information in there,” Denney said.
However, Noteworthy does not have its own separate website outside of its page on BYU Performing Arts, while Vocal Point has a separate website.
Whitcomb said that when she brought up the idea of getting a website for Noteworthy, she was told by Performing Arts Management that putting up a website for the women was not worth the hassle in terms of having someone update it and that it cost too much money.
“If Noteworthy wanted a website, then they could have one,” Wright said. “What we would discourage is having a website that is stagnant and outdated.”
Denney said all performing groups under Performing Arts Management, including Noteworthy and Vocal Point, have webpages maintained by Performing Arts Management on the Performing Arts Management website.
“My understanding is that Vocal Point also has an independent website that was created by a member of the group years ago as a class project,” Denney said. “That website has always been and is still managed separately by Vocal Point.”
Whitcomb said after Performing Arts Management told her a Noteworthy website would be too expensive, she then decided to send Wright and his assistant pictures and press materials to update their section on the Performing Arts Management website, but they never did.
“We promote each group equally like we do all our groups,” Wright said.
Denney also said the contracts for both groups should be very similar.
The Daily Universe asked Performing Arts Management, Vocal Point current and former members and their director for a contract, but was denied a copy claiming it would be a breach of their privacy and they were not comfortable sharing it.
Opportunity to go on an international tour
In 2019, an international tour was announced for many BYU performing groups including Vocal Point, Young Ambassadors, Living Legends, International Folk Dance, American Folk Dance Ensemble, The Chamber Orchestra and The Ballroom Dance Company. Noteworthy was not included in the tour.
“They (Performing Arts Management) told us the same answer, like, ‘You guys aren’t ready, you haven’t been around long enough, you don’t have a big enough fan base,’ kind of thing,” Mertz said.
However, Mertz explained she had been told by BYU Music Group’s general manager Ben Fales that Noteworthy and Vocal Point were the performing groups that made the most money for BYU Music Group. BYU Music Group represents various performing groups such as Living Legends, Young Ambassadors, BYU Chamber Orchestra and BYU Men’s Choir, among others.
Fales confirmed this information to The Daily Universe, and said “Noteworthy generates the second most views and streams, and thus revenue, behind Vocal Point, but it’s a distant second.”
“We weren’t invited to the China tour but we bring in more revenue than the other groups,” Wawro McMillan said. “We got told we need to hold down a director to even go on tour and that we weren’t ready and still needed to prove that we were.”
Wawro McMillan also explained it is hard to keep a director for Noteworthy because they are part-time, whereas Vocal Point’s director is a full-time employee.
“Our director is supposed to do the same things as McKay does, but they would be paid as part-time,” she said. “It is not our fault that female directors don’t want to take that position when they are also not listened to.”
“The implication was that I, as the director, needed to be facilitating these fundraising or alumni events and I was like, ‘This isn’t in my job description,’ I’m a part-time like adjunct faculty,” Whitcomb said. “It just didn’t all add up.”
Denney said Performing Arts Management is reviewing the situation, but that at the moment, both groups, Noteworthy and Vocal Point, are self-funded, which includes funding for their directors.
“We are reviewing this situation,” Denney said. “Noteworthy currently brings in enough funds to support an adjunct faculty position as director.”
BYU’s performing groups are given opportunities to tour regionally, nationally and internationally after being approved by the Performing Arts Management advisory council.
“Touring is very expensive and challenging and a group needs to be able to prove that they have a strong enough following, that they generate enough of an audience to be able to bring in the audience that’s going to merit a tour,” Denney said.
To this, Whitcomb explained she was never given a specific criteria as to what it meant to ‘earn it’ or to ‘prove themselves’ to management.
“They kept speaking on these generalities so it’s hard for us to know what we need to do or what number we need to reach to be approved to travel internationally,” Whitcomb said.
Denney explained there have been discussions regarding Noteworthy touring internationally.
“Because of Title IX, should Noteworthy be able to travel internationally as well as Vocal Point? Maybe,” Denney said. “There’s also this side of it: It doesn’t make sense to send them out just because they are women. We will continue to work on this issue.”
When asked about Noteworthy’s concerns about the lack of performing opportunities compared to Vocal Point, Fales said “if someone says, ’Noteworthy doesn’t get as many opportunities as Vocal Point,’ I would hope they would remember that Vocal Point has been part of BYU since the 1990s and the group has only recently been able to tour outside of the Utah/Idaho/Wyoming area.”
“Also, I believe performance opportunities are often a result of people asking for a group to come perform in their city or at their event, which is out of BYU’s control,” Fales said.
Whitcomb and members of Noteworthy believed they had proven themselves to be capable of touring as their YouTube channel, created in 2012 has 111,260,340 views. The group’s cover of Amazing Grace has the highest number of views of any BYU Music Group video, with nearly 70 million views. The group has also appeared on NBC’s The Sing-Off and won first place at the International Champion of Collegiate A Cappella in 2007.
When asking Crockett about YouTube and its revenue, he said all music videos are handled through BYU Music Group.
“Certain groups bring in certain amounts of money based on views and streams and depending on the money that comes in, groups are given opportunities to record music videos,” Crockett said.
Noteworthy former members also said they didn’t feel as much support or as many resources were put into their videos, even when they had the most viewed video of BYU Music Group.
“When Noteworthy became part of BYU in 2014, under the auspices of Performing Arts Management, they were an unproven group in terms of reach and profitability for us here at BYU Music Group,” Fales said. “At first we were a little hesitant with how much money we thought we should put into the group’s albums and music videos, but we took a leap of faith, and the group has had some incredible successes.”
Fales explained how YouTube videos mostly don’t make any money back, since per one million views they get $1,000 to $1,500.
“Life isn’t fair sometimes and things take a long time,” Fales said.
In response to Noteworthy’s complaints about inequity in video production, Fales explained that there are different types of artists, female artists and male artists and said “it’s hard for the women in the music industry.”
Noteworthy has more Instagram followers and YouTube subscribers than any of the other groups that were included in the tour, except for Vocal Point.
“They’re not approved by the university to travel internationally and they’re going to need to build their brand and be able to bring in a lot more local audience members before we can send them out to try to get international audience members,” Denney said. “Touring, including international touring, is an area where we are committed to helping Noteworthy.”
After COVID-19 hit in 2020, many of the groups scheduled to tour had to cancel performances. Noteworthy was also planning a performance in Arizona that year, which was canceled because of the pandemic.
A virtual tour was created so BYU artists could still showcase what they had been planning to tour. Noteworthy was also not invited to join the virtual tour, even though allowing them to participate would not create a financial risk since travel expenses were reduced to none.
Denney said there were six groups represented by Performing Arts Management which were scheduled to go on international tours in 2021. Noteworthy was not approved to go on an international tour in 2021, but according to Mertz, the group had a scheduled California tour on that year.
“Of the six groups that were approved to tour in 2021, we invited all of those six groups to be a part of the virtual tour,” Denney said.
Denney also said the reason Noteworthy was not invited was because the virtual tour was a “Band-aid” made for the six groups that were scheduled to travel internationally.
“We feel like we are ready for those opportunities and we are ready to go and perform internationally and I feel like we’ve kind of made our mark as a group,” Mertz said. “I feel like we do deserve those opportunities as well.”
Whitcomb said the idea that Vocal Point was working harder to receive more funding and opportunities was something she was commonly told by the group’s management, especially when discrepancies in the groups’ online presence and promotional differences were brought up.
Whitcomb said she was often given hope by management that they would implement ideas to improve the program, but she felt abandoned by them after trying to prove herself and the program.
“The support and help would just vanish, and that happened a lot in pre-production for several music videos,” Whitcomb said. “There were moments that I either felt horrendously under-supported or very supported.”
Being vocal on social media and an addendum to Noteworthy’s contract
In March 2021, Noteworthy released a music video covering “It’s a Man’s, Man’s, Man’s World.”
Following the release of the video, Newbold posted about the release and shared her personal experiences of being in the group.
Noteworthy is the best representation I can offer of my musical truth. Authenticity, vulnerability, freedom, the search for belonging, and the collective power of women’s voices. How frustrating it must be for me, then, to watch as Noteworthy was repeatedly pushed aside, ignored, criticized and overlooked as we have been repeatedly compared to our male counterparts. We’ve been held to unrealistic and unknown standards as we fought for equality of opportunity, resources and respect within our own BYU community and beyond.
(Lizzy Newbold via Instagram)
Several other members of Noteworthy took to social media to share their experiences.
Wawro McMillan shared screenshots from the video along with text saying:
“We aren’t always listened to in meetings. When we have a plan or vision, it’s often overlooked or completely denied and because most of the people above us are men, we are consistently trying to navigate how to make our voices heard. The reality is, we DO live in a Man’s World. When I joined Noteworthy, I became acutely aware of the unrelenting inequality that women are facing right under our noses. We have battled misogyny in our meetings, in our comments, in our shows and in our interactions.”
Newbold said it was a conscious decision from each member to post their individual experiences being a part of Noteworthy and to express the sexism the women felt they experienced.
“The constant comparison of our group to our male counterparts has been a theme throughout the entirety of my Noteworthy experience. My experience has been incredible, unbelievable, and don’t misunderstand, I don’t take it for granted for one minute. However, withheld opportunities, tours, and performances because ‘you girls are just not ready yet’ is something we’ve become accustomed to,” Meg Ackerman, another Noteworthy member from 2018-2021, said on her Instagram.
According to Performing Arts Management and former Noteworthy members, BYU Music Group found the series of posts to be inappropriate and asked Whitcomb to tell the women to take down the posts. The women were told because they represent BYU, they are not allowed to make public statements that could be perceived as disparaging toward the university and its management.
“That song meant a lot to us because we have felt like we faced a lot of discrimination and sexism at BYU,” Mertz said. “It wasn’t like a planned thing or anything, we all just decided to post on our own and it got a lot of feedback from our friends, mostly positive but our management didn’t like that because it did look bad to BYU.”
According to Newbold, members of the group expressed their concerns in a Zoom meeting with Performing Arts Management following the music video release.
According to Newbold, the group was told they had not made a great enough effort to convince management that they were ready for additional touring or music video opportunities.
Newbold also said the group was told that because Vocal Point had asked for more, they were given more.
“I remember walking away from the meeting feeling, like, completely gutted,” Newbold said. “I felt like the music video opportunity was a really hopeful opportunity for me and for my Noteworthy sisters to be able to talk about discrepancies happening at BYU. It just kind of invalidated the work that we had done in that video and throughout my whole career in Noteworthy.”
When comparing the Noteworthy 2020-2021 contracts to the 2021-2022 contracts, The Daily Universe noticed a section had been added to the latter contract. This addendum to the 2021-2022 contract required that members “refrain from any public discourse that disparages BYU, Noteworthy, or any of its affiliated entities and departments.”
Although several Noteworthy members felt dismissed by their management and compared to their male counterparts, Mertz said being a part of Noteworthy has been a blessing.
“Being in Noteworthy has been one of the most incredible experiences of my whole life and I wouldn’t change it for anything,” Mertz said. “I’m extremely grateful to BYU for all the amazing opportunities that I’ve gotten to have through this group, but I’ve also faced a lot of frustration at times when it feels like it isn’t totally fair.”
When former Noteworthy members were asked about their experience, they emphasized their frustrations had always been directed toward management and not toward Vocal Point.
Quinn also expressed her feelings regarding other former Noteworthy members’ experience with Performing Arts Management.
“I am saddened to hear that several of the Noteworthy members or past members of Noteworthy have expressed feelings that they have been treated unequally by Performing Arts Management,” Quinn said.
