A former Britain's Got Talent singer has slammed festivals and the music industry for their lack of inclusivity in lineups, urging the industry to take more action. Kelli-Leigh Henry-Davila, 39, is an independent musician known for her hits, including uncredited vocals on Duke Dumont's chart-topping track I Got U and I Wanna Feel by Second City. She is also recognized for her credited vocals on the UK top 10 single More Than Friends by James Hype.
In an exclusive with The Mirror, Kelli-Leigh discussed the lack of inclusivity in the music industry. She explained: "I'm not going to be the first woman to talk about how they feel the sexism in the music industry has been. Also, being a woman of colour especially in the electronic and dance music space, that's definitely something I've spoken about and a lot of other women of colour, in dance, have spoken about it aswell.
"It's definitely not been a level playing field and been equal but I think what is positive is that it's being discussed more openly know and people are more open to realisation because if you just do the research and look at the stats and see how many artists are signed, you can see instantly how many of those are men, how many of those are women and amongst those women, how many of them are certain races and ethnicities and which music genres they're aligned with.
"I think it's pretty evident how it's been over the past years but what is good to see and positive to see is that other people are working on changing that. We've still got a way to go, but what is really positive is that people are making those steps and people are taking that on board. The music industry is looking at line-ups more, I know Jaguar from BBC has talked about the inclusivity rider for live shows. you've got to hope that more people take it on board."
Kelli-Leigh also criticised festivals for their failure to maintain a 50-50 lineup between men and women. She explained: "If you have major power players in the music industry, who have got massive line-ups at festivals, they need to say to the festivals and the booking teams, that they need to be doing 50-50 line-ups with women and men.
"And again if we're looking at the inclusivity of artists, on the rider and the line-up and seeing who they've booked and how many of those artists are people of colour and how many are LGBTQ artists. it's actually easy to do, it just takes people to look at it and go 'ok, we can do better here'."
Kelli-Leigh was part of the group Band of Voices, which appeared on the 2013 series of Britain's Got Talent. The group wowed audiences with their a cappella version of Jessie J's "Price Tag," securing a place in the live shows and advancing to the semi-finals. However, Kelli-Leigh decided to leave after just one performance. Since then, she has gone on to achieve international fame and earn multiple Grammy Award nominations.
Explaining how the group ended up on the show, Kelli-Leigh shared, "We were doing five-part harmonies of pop songs as we suddenly had this opportunity presented to us to sing for BGT on a straight, live audition. We didn't have to do a pre-audition because some of the producers had seen us. Our first audition is the performance that you can see on BGT."
This performance became one of the show's most-watched auditions. Reflecting on the experience in the You Know My Voice podcast, Kelli-Leigh said: "The performance, I absolutely loved. It was the most amazing experience to go out there, it was really nerve wracking then the crowd just reacted and we got all the yeses."
Kelli-Leigh hosts a podcast called You Know My Voice, where she interviews vocal artists about their personal stories. She has also teased the release of new music in 2025. The Grammy-nominated songstress previously revealed that as a woman of colour, she is "constantly overlooked" in the industry.
Follow Mirror Celebs on Snapchat , Instagram , Twitter , Facebook , YouTube and Threads .