There is no shortage of awards shows. Every time you turn around, it seems there’s some brand new red-carpet event. From the Billboard Music Awards to the American Music Awards to the People’s Choice Awards to the VMAs, there’s no argument that “music’s biggest night” is still, without question, the coveted Grammy Awards.
On January 31, 2010, the Grammy Awards ceremony will mark the 52nd year the cute little statues have been given out. In fact, the awards have outlived the gramophone they were named for and modeled after.
My friend, Eric Tingstad, of the instrumental duo Tingstad and Rumbel, proudly displays his own Grammy on the fireplace mantle of his home. He and musical partner Nancy Rumbel won the golden statuette for Best New Age Recording in 2002 for “Acoustic Garden.” I can’t walk past that Grammy without picking it up. It’s so bright and shiny and impressive. Best of all, it has the name of my friends engraved on it so it’s personalized, too. Everything about winning a Grammy is heavy, both literally and figuratively.
But what most musicians don’t know, is that what you see on the awards show only represents a handful of Grammys given out each year—less than 15 of the total 109. This means there are plenty of other Grammys to go around.
And while the competition for a Grammy is steep (the annual entries received range from 15,000 to 19,000), there are categories you may not know about. There are Grammys awarded for Best Short Form Video and Best Long Form Music Video, Best Instrumental Composition, Packaging, Album Notes, Best Tropical Latin Album, Best Banda Album, Best Hawaiian Album and even best Surround Sound album. In other words, there’s a lot more to the Grammys than meets the ear.
Bill Freimuth, Vice President of Awards and Nominations, says most people would be surprised just how complex the process is. And, like the music industry itself, it’s constantly a work-in-progress. This year, for example, Americana has been recognized as an official category for the first time. Since this process is even more complicated than getting a new dog breed recognized by the AKC, I asked Bill to explain how a new Grammy category is born.
Three years ago—through a proposal to the Awards and Nominations Committee—NARAS (The National Association of Recording Arts and Sciences, Grammy’s real name), added Americana to the Contemporary Folk category, making it Contemporary Folk/Americana . This year, the entire folk field was renamed and restructured so it’s now called American Roots Music. Next, blues categories were brought into this new field, as was Bluegrass, from the Country field. Then Americana was split out from Contemporary Folk as its own category.
While new categories take time to gestate, other categories bite the dust. This year, the Best Polka Album category is going the way of the cassette tape. There was also once a Female Rock Vocal category, but that one went away because of a lack of entries. Personally, I wish Alternative could find another name to reflect independent artists since, after 20 years, that word doesn’t really mean anything any more.
So why, exactly, do some Grammys get axed while others thrive? Bill explains that categories that don’t meet the minimum thresholds of entries are discussed at the annual Awards and Nominations Committee meeting. This committee is a gathering of nearly 5o musical experts that cross musical genre and geographical lines. All decisions must be ratified by the National Board of Trustees.
One of the most heated debates every year is over the Best New Artist category. When Lauren Hill and Shelby Lynne received Best New Artist Grammys, there was a media uproar because they both been kicking around awhile before they became household names. So how does an artist qualify to win that one? Bill says an artist must have released at least one but not more than three albums within the eligibility year and the year that an artist wins, must be the first year that the artist “attained public prominence.” “It’s the gray area of that last part that causes a lot of discussion,” Bill says.
Another area of confusion is the nomination process itself and what constitutes an actual nomination. Back when I published a magazine, I used to get press releases from unknown artists that insisted they were nominated for a Grammy. Most of the time, this wasn’t exactly true. Everyone who submits gets on to the first ballot. So people, please don’t claim you were nominated for a Grammy when you get on that first ballot. What you are really saying is that you filled out the paperwork properly. That is not a nomination.
And, as you would imagine, it takes a village to create a Grammy telecast. Bill’s awards staff is comprised of 16 full time, 1 part time and up to 4 temps at any given time. Most staff members have specific genre-management assignments and, as the big day approaches, there are all hands on deck. Suddenly it’s Grammy day and the Staples Center is filled with press, celebrities, nominees from all 109 categories and a bit of on-stage drama for good measure. Bill says his favorite televised Grammy moment, if he had to pick one, would be Radiohead playing with the USC Marching Band.
Grand as it is, NARAS does a lot more than put on an awards show. They raise money for musicians and music industry folks in need through MusiCares, the Grammy’s charitable arm. (They gave money to help rebuild New Orlean’s music community after Katrina.) A new Grammy Museum recently opened in Los Angeles. And the organization is visibly involved with advocacy for legislation that affects musicians at every career level.
So, yes, the Grammys really are a big deal and cover a lot of ground. But it’s still the most coveted award of them all. Why is it so prestigious? “Because it’s a peer-based award,” says Bill, “music professionals recognizing other music professionals. There’s that and also the integrity of the process. You can’t buy a Grammy.”
