Sabrina Carpenter poses in the press room with the award for best pop solo performance, and best pop vocal album during the 67th annual Grammy Awards. (AP/PTI)
Feb 3, 2025 18:20 IST First published on: Feb 3, 2025 at 18:20 IST
Here we are. Yet another year, with a perfunctory curiosity about the Grammys — who won, who lost and did Ye (née Kanye West) do something outrageous? (This time, he showed up in an all-black-everything outfit while wife Bianca Censori, dressed down to an all-nada-nothing).
Indians woke up with news of a win by Indian-American vocalist Chandrika Tandon’s album Triveni (sis to biz wiz Indra Nooyi) in the verbosely-titled category Best New Age, Ambient or Chant Album. And the loss was, you guessed it, the no-mention of Zakir Hussain among the Recording Academy’s “In Memoriam” segment, which honours music industry greats who passed away the previous year. Our very own Chris Martin (from Sanjay Gandhi National Park) sang All My Love as the Record Academy remembered Quincy Jones, Liam Payne, Toby Keith, Rich Homie Quan and Cissy Houston.
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Lest the indignation turns to hatred, it is good to remember that the Grammys are actually, not that big a deal, and definitely not the holy grail of music. Yes, the awards recognise the talent and cultural influence of musical artists across a whopping 83 categories, but from a very myopic American industry-led profit-oriented lens. The Record Academy — perhaps only famous for hosting the Grammys — is an American academy of musicians, producers, and musical professionals. These Academy members decide the screening and voting process, repeatedly criticised for being notoriously secretive.
Even as recent as 2021, the Recording Academy had a secret “nominations review committee” that could override the general vote in key categories. The committee has since been dissolved following backlash from artists like The Weeknd, Zayn Malik and Hasley. Malik had even tweeted then: “F**k the grammys and everyone associated. Unless you shake hands and send gifts, there’s no nomination considerations. Next year I’ll send you a basket of confectionery (sic).”
In an article in Complex, hip-hop author Rob Kenner, who spoke to some committee members, said there was an unwritten rule to favour an album by someone famous. He wrote: “Famous people tend to get more votes from clueless Academy members, regardless of the quality of their work… the vast majority of the nominations are chosen by people who have little real expertise in a given field.”
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Year after year, why doesn’t your favourite musical artist win a Grammy nomination, let alone win it? This is because the Academy voters often pick familiar names and chart-topping artists. This practically forces an artist to gain recognition before they get a mere nomination. “Music’s biggest night” could just be a popularity contest.
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One of the biggest impediments for any music to make it to the Grammys is the clause: The work must be commercially released and available in the US, either through digital or physical formats. Say goodbye to your favourite Soundcloud rapper or YouTube musician or any other artist who doesn’t have their music released on streaming platforms such as Spotify, iTunes or Amazon Music.
However, since 2019, people of colour in the Recording Academy have gone from 24 per cent of the Academy’s total membership to 38 per cent and women make up 30 per cent of the total. While the removal of secret committees was a step toward fairness, the Grammys still favour industry-backed, mainstream artists. The selection process remains controversial, especially in how it treats certain genres and independent musicians.
aditya.vaddepalli@expressindia.com
