The New York mayor's office has announced a new scheme which will see $500,000 made available as grants for women working within music.

As Resident Advisor reports, The New York Office Of Media And Entertainment (MOME) is overseeing the fund, alongside the New York Foundation For The Arts, which is open to musicians and industry figures who identify as female.

Applications opened earlier this week and will remain open until October 1. MOME's senior executive direction Shira Gans has stated that the fund is not just open to musicians, but also to those working behind the scenes as recording engineers or in other related roles.

""We didn't want it just to be about female musical acts," she said. "We wanted to make sure we were really promoting projects that had a female credit for writers, engineers and producers."

Applications will be separated into two categories, with funds open to those working within 'classical, experimental, new music and jazz', and those working across other genres.

"The fund will provide up to $20,000 to support the production of a new EP, album or music video(s) for yet-to-be-released work where the principal place of recording or production is New York City," said the mayor's office.

You can find out more, and put in your own application, here.