I'm writing the evening after the annual Grammy Award show. I don't usually watch the telecast. Like so many others I have too often found the proceedings to be superficial, hypocritical, wildly inappropriate or often in simply bad taste...with a few moments of genuine feeling or notability interspersed. So in recent years I just glimpsed portions when other members of my household turned the show on. This time, spurred I think by Whitney Houston's untimely death, I did tune in from the beginning of the broadcase, curious and hopeful, to see if this event, which in appearance anyway, is a communal celebration of the the music industry, would in some way acknowledge and perhaps ameloriate the shock and sadness being felt by so many members of the music community. I wondered if the Grammy Awards would rise to the occasion, understanding that given the timing of Whitney's death, only 24 hours prior, that any such effort would be challenging.
The Grammy Awards have become notorious for getting things wrong--sometimes even wildly wrong on even basic facts, as when an artist wins a Grammy in a category that they clearly do not fit. The Awards do not necessarily reflect artistic quality or achievement nor do they necessarily reflect what is most popular. The Awards are the result of an often quixotic, often highly political process. Too often the Awards are a result of simple ignorance. Given that, it is somewhat surprising that these awards mean so much to artists, producers, songwriters and other honorees. But maybe that is not too surprising as the awards are supposed to be an honor bestowed by their peers in the industry. For too many artists, their sense of self worth is enhanced or diminished by whether they win a Grammy. The most bemusing example that I can recall is when Black Uhuru, a militant, politically-oriented Rasta reggae group whose hard-hitting lyrics castigated Babylonian corruption, won a Grammy for Best Reggae album one year. Their lead singer, Michael Rose, began calling himself Michael "Grammy" Rose....how could an exile from Babylon be proud of winning a Grammy?
Grammy Awards, contrary to popular belief, don't, by and large, have much impact on sales. Oh, if you win Record Of The Year or perform on the show, and your record label markets behind that, an artist can see a sales jump. But most of the awards in most categories have zero impact on sales.However, winning a Grammy can confer a certain amount of prestige to an artist and can make the artist more worthy of media coverage or more worthy of a booking at a high-end venue. So it does have some practical value.
I guess the only reason I care about the Grammy Awards is that so many artists who I know or work with badly want to win one. For that reason, I do my best to help that achieve that goal. As a NARAS member I understand the process...and will reveal it here:
The whole Grammy selection process is greatly misunderstood by the public and even by many in the music industry. First of all, the Grammy Awards are made by NARAS, which stands for the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. Only NARAS members may participate in the process. Who are NARAS members? Music industry professionals who have created, contributed to or worked on recordings in certain capacities: musician, singer, producer, songwriter, engineer etc. Only those people can be NARAS members. A radio promotion person, or publicist, or A & R person (if he or she has never done any of the things above), booking agent, record company administrator, club promoter etc etc are not eligible to be NARAS members. You must be eligible, according to whether you have fulfilled certain criteria in participating in the recording process. Finally, you can only be a member if you join NARAS and pay the annual dues; many eligble people in the industry do not join.
Voting NARAS members are the ones who determine who wins a Grammy. The process works like this: recording companies and NARAS members have an opportunity at certain points during the year to submit recordings in one of more eligible categories for consideration to be on the Grammy ballot. NARAS screening committees check out the recordings to determine if they in fact do qualify to be in that category and whether they meet certain other criteria (like being released during a certain time frame to qualify for that year's voting). Contrary to popular belief, the screening committees do not have latitude to pick what recordings they want to go on the ballot EXCEPT to determine if they fit the basic criteria and fit in the submitted category. If a recording doesn't fit a certain category, the committee usually recommends it to another category. A friend of mine was vilified in Jamaica because he was on the reggae category screening committee and some people in Jamaica thought that meant he could determine what went on the ballot or what recordings would win. Not true!
Once the screening is done, all the eligible recordings are put in the relevant categories on a ballot which is sent out to the entire NARAS voting membership. Some artists think that if they make it to this stage they've somehow been nominated. Not true. They are just on the ballot. Once the members vote--at least the members who bother to vote--the top five vote-getters in each category become the nominees. An artist who makes it to this stage has been nominated for a Grammy Award. Then there is a new ballot with all the nominees in each category and the members vote. The votes are tallied and the biggest vote getters in each category become Grammy Award winners in that category: "Best R & B Vocal Performance", "Record Of The Year", "Best Instrumental Jazz Solo" etc.
Various people try to influence the voting in various ways. Some companies take out advertisements touting their artists' nominations. E-mail, phone and word of mouth campaigns are often conducted to urge people to vote for one artist or another. People in an organization are urged to vote for artists associated with that organization. Larger companies have an advantage in that they can afford to take more and larger ads and also they have more people who may be NARAS members who likely will vote in support their artists. But in the end it is the individual votes of the individual NARAS members who bother to vote that determine the winners. The problem is, many of the voters are not expert in the categories they are voting for. Often they simply vote for a familiar name. This explains why back in the late Sixties/early Seventies, BB King won the Best Blues Album award several years in a row; he was probably the only blues artist many members had heard of. Similarly, anyone with the name "Marley" or the word "Marley" in an album title tends to win a Grammy in the Best Reggae Album category. Beyonce won "Best Traditional R & B Recording" one year. So the winners are very much the product of happenstance--how many of the eligible voters vote; how many members vote in categories they don't know much about; how much name-recognition plays into the process and how much promotion/politicking plays in. This is why the results have too often been absurd.
To its credit, NARAS has attempted to address some of these problems. Over the years the screening process was refined. Members are urged to vote only in categories of which they have knowledge. Members are forbidden to do overt politicking and the ballot info is labeled "proprietary" so that companies cannot be too specific in their advertising/promotion efforts. But these efforst fall short of their goal.
Sometimes the process can be maddening. This year, I submitted the outstanding Afro/French group Les Nubians for the Best World Music Album category. But when I received the nomination ballot, I did not find Les Nubians. I called the NARAS office and was informed that the world music screening committee had determined that they did not fit that category. Les Nubians was shunted to the Alternative screening committee, who also rejected them, and then to "Best Pop Vocal Album" category, where they were accepted. Of course this was ludicrous. The artists in the Best Pop Vocal Album category were mostly mainstream pop artists. Les Nubians are African/French in ethnicity, their music combines elements of African styles, Caribbean styles, hip hop and R & B. In addition, their album hit #1 on the Billboard World Music chart. By any sane measure, they are world music artists. But the world music committee didn't think so and so they ended up being moved from a category where they had a good chance of winning to a category where they had no chance of winning. This move, in my opinion, cost Les Nubians, at minimum, a Grammy nomination this year.
You may also have heard that during this past year, the NARAS powers that be eliminated a large number of categories, many of the ethnic--such as Best Native American Album--and others niche--such as best Alternative R & B Performance--consolidating and combining categories as well as eliminating some. Under Americana, for instance, recordings as diverse as folk singers and zyedeco artists were put together. What this meant is that many artists categories and many ethnic artists suddenly have little or no chance of winning a Grammy. This is particularly unfortunate because it is precisely these artists who often most benefit from winning a Grammy. It can be crucial to winning limited booking opportunities or being accepted into the mainstream or getting media coverage. This was done without seeking the input of the NARAS membership.
What to do about the Grammy Award process? I'm afraid it cannot be fixed satisfactorily. I personally urge that the categories that were eliminated be reinstated. And I am agitating toward that goal. But it is impossible to ensure that the Grammy Awards reflect the true excellence of artists in a given year. So why are the Grammy Awards relevant? Because the artists care. And for that reason I stay active as a NARAS member, I vote as responsibly as I can, and I advocate on behalf of artists I know to be worthy. I do so knowing that I am part of a flawed process that all too often yields bittersweet results.
And this year's Grammy broadcast? Based on my glimpses of previous years, I'd say it was the best in a number of years. LL Cool J was a good host--much more real, down to earth and classy than many hosts in recent yeras. He began the evening with a prayer for Whitney Houston, heaftfelt and simple.The sets and overall production I felt were often spectacular. The artist tributes to Glen Campbell, The Beach Boys and others were nicely done, with younger artists performing their songs and then the celegrated artists themselves performing a song. And Jennifer Hudson gave an emotionally committed and nicely delivered tribute to Whitney. So maybe there's hope.
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