Titwrench Fest collage by Daralee Fallin and Katrin Davis.

The lack of female representation in rock — and the larger music world — has always been a troubling thing. Are there fewer female musicians because they’re not getting gigs and opportunities, or simply because they’re not being encouraged by example to take the stage and develop their voices?

Regardless, Denver’s first annual Titwrench Fest is an antidote to the sea of dudes with guitars, an experimental, women-centered music fest featuring some of the most bracing new voices in music from around the world (think folk, ambient, psychedelic, punk, noise and thrash). The fest also includes dance, video art, fashion, crafts and other locally made goods, vegetarian-friendly food and visual art.

Of course, women and men (and all ages) are welcome at the festival, which takes place tomorrow through Sunday (July 24-26) at a trio of Denver’s best underground music venues — Glob, Blast-O-Mat and Rhinoceropolis.

And while Titwrench runs concurrent with the Denver Post’s own Underground Music Showcase on South Broadway, each worthy event also runs for multiple days, so you check them both out!

We chatted briefly today with founder Sarah Slater, a Denver-based photographer and veteran festival organizer, about the inspiration behind Titwrench, some of the acts to see and Denver’s women-in-music scorecard in 2009.

When did you hatch the idea for Titwrench?

I’ve been wanting to do this festival for a long time, but it was last fall when I went to the High Mayhem fest in Santa Fe — it’s sort of this community-organized experimental music festival that’s all ages — and I guess that really catalyzed me into trying to get this organized and do something similar in Denver. I wanted to focus it on women musicians because I feel it’s really important to do something that will bring different women artists together and create community out of that. But the festival is definitely welcoming to everybody.

What’s the ideal outcome of the festival?

The ideal is a lot of people are really inspired by the music and artwork that they see and that they participate in this weekend, and from there continue to create their own art and get it out in the world. We want people to support their fellow artists and especially women artists and musicians. We’re hoping we can cultivate that through this festival.

Are there any particular performers you’re looking forward to?

We’re bringing out Becca Mhalek, formerly of Nightshark, who’s living in L.A. now. She’s really developing her career further as a musican out there, so we’re really excited to have her back in Denver. We’re also really excited about Marlo Eggplant form Seattle. She runs a noise label and distro and just is a really big fixture in the noise community. I’m excited to see Hell Kite, who’s from Tempe, Arizona. She calls herself “doom folk” and does kind of a darker, experimental sort of folk music. I’ve only seen her solo but she’s bringing a band with her this time. I could go on…

What do you think about the gender diversity of the Denver music scene in 2009?

2009 is much better than it was 10 years ago, I think, because although there were plenty of women musicians and women playing music ten years, ago, I don’t think as many of them were getting out there. They weren’t doing shows and weren’t as visible. It’s so much better now than it was then, but overall we’re just trying to promote more balance in the scene in general and awareness in people booking shows. It’s about trying to find a more balanced way to do that and have different genders and ideas represented. But there’s definitely tons of amazing women musicians right now in Colorado.

And you’ll obviously have excellent local representation at the fest…

lot of them have really come out the woodwork for our festival or contacted us via MySpace. Some of them are younger, some are older, some found out about festival through word of mouth. It’s really exciting to me that we have several who haven’t played out before and we’re really showcasing them as part of the festival.

Can you name any in particular?

Hot White from Parker — they have a really raw, energetic sound. Origami Hands from Fort Collins — they’re a duo that plays lap steel and synthesizer. Christina the Hun from Fort Collins — she’s this kind of drummer-singer extraordinaire, a one-woman band that has a funky dissonant quality to her music that I really enjoy. We’re also featuring Brittany Gould, from Married in Berdichev, who’s also curating an art show in conjunction with the festival that’s all female artists as well.

Why is in important that it’s all ages?

It’s a good example for young women because it’s hard to imagine yourself doing something if you don’t see it out there in the world happening. So the more visible we can have women artists be in msuic and art and film and all those realms, the more inspiration and role models we’ll have for future generations.

Anything else you’d like to add?

People have been asking if we’re going to continue to do this because it’s our first year, and I just wanted to say that we’ve had a really good experience working on the festival together — the nine of us — and we’re going to stay together as a group and put together shows and parties under the Titwrench name.