M³ (Mutual Mentorship for Musicians) is an initiative dedicated to advancing professional and artistic growth for women and gender-expansive musicians. M³ provides a platform for creative risk-taking,  exchange through musical commissions, peer-led mentorship, publication of anthologies, performances, festivals, and awards. M³ brings together musicians across genres, generations, and backgrounds to foster meaningful collaboration, helping artists navigate the journey from learning to leading in the field, while strengthening the community within the music world.

Co-founded in 2020 by vocalist-composers Jen Shyu and Sara Serpa, M³ recognizes that the music, with its multiple languages and traditions, has been mostly shaped by male power, resulting in unbalanced environments and presenting multiple challenges for composer-performers from underrepresented groups to have access to meaningful and respectful mentorship. Since then, M³ has already served a global community of hundreds of composer-performers, pioneering a growing new model of support and creativity. 

M³ operates under the conviction that when women and gender-expansive composer-performers are supported, they feel valued, expand collaborations, and are made visible. A fundamental component of M³’s identity emphasizes process over product; this manifests in every aspect of our mission, starting with the prioritization of women and gender-expansive composers who write, perform, and improvise their own music, from inception to completion.

By supporting artistic excellence through each cohort, M³ creates expandable music communities, while developing sustained lucrative career opportunities for women and non-binary composer-performers in the industry, in particular for women and non-binary composer-performers of color. 

By building a non-hierarchical and intergenerational paradigm of mentorship, M³ celebrates a global network of artists, providing a think tank for new ways to connect, collaborate, perform, support and create.

With the aim of building new paradigms of mentorship, M³ encourages: 

a) reciprocal intergenerational exchange of knowledge and experience,

b) formation of new collaborations with musicians outside of one’s inner circle,

c) cultivation of new ideas and new formats for solo and collaborative performance, both live and/or virtual.