The GRAMMYs : To Be Continued

 This past weekend, I watched the 67th annual Grammy Awards by the Recording Academy and it had me thinking... How valid are the Grammy Awards?

It is generally received by most people that the Grammy Awards is an entertainment award ceremony for entertainment. It comes with a red carpet to show off the established and experienced artists as well as the up-and-coming ones with smashing debuts. The host is often an experienced talker who captures the audiences' attentions easily and make funny jokes while walking around the tables seated with fabulous musicians. Then the awards are presented by celebrities and familiar faces, accompanied with a sparkling award.

Some performances of notable songs throughout the year are sprinkled around and then the end. But have you ever wondered exactly how they choose which songs or which artists get the awards?

First of all, to understand the process of voting and getting the nominations and winners, the structure of the Recording Academy must be understood. There are twelve chapters spread across the nation, mostly city based. The Atlanta, Chicago, Florida, Los Angeles, Memphis, Nashville, New York, Pacific Northwest, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Texas, and Washington D.C. chapters. There are more than 16,000 members and around 13,000 voting members apart of the Recording Academy as a whole. There are two main branches: The Producers and Engineers Wing and the Songwriters and Composers Wing. 

"The P&E Wing advises the Academy on technical matters related to recording and also addresses matters of concern to producers, engineers, remixers, manufacturers, technologists, and other related professionals. "

"The S&C Wing will provide opportunities for recognition, networking and collaboration, and welcomes the prospect of new Academy members. The Wing will also spotlight emerging opportunities for song and scoring achievement within a variety of media on a global basis."

-The Recording Academy 

Great, so now that the Recording Academy is laid out, let's get into the Process of finding the best music of the year. Turns out, the whole process isn't actually all that simple. First, songs are submitted to the Online Entry Process through the Recording Academy, this year being through the dates July, 17, 2024 - August, 30, 2024. Around 20,000 entries of different songs, music videos, albums, or recordings are submitted each year. Secondly, each entry goes through a general screening process where the Recording Academy filters every submission into a genre or category.

There are 94 Categories (The awards, example Best Album of the Year) and 22 Genres (Example Pop, R&B, Rap, Country)

Click Here to see the full Guide

Then, the first round of voting. This round is to determine the Grammy Nominees, where over 350+ members of the Academy are given their First Round Online Ballot. And to ensure the quality of the vote, the members are encouraged to only vote within their own area of expertise. Each member votes in up to ten categories across up to three genre fields. Then they also put in their votes for the six categories of the General Field. (General Field categories are above.) This first round goes through and gets put into a table through an independent accounting firm Deloitte & Touche LLP. (Yes, that's right. There's a whole accounting firm.)

There exists Special Nominating Committees where Craft categories, final nominations are determined by committees made up of voting members from all of the Academy's Chapter cities who are actively working the craft they are judging. However, these committees were criticized for being controversial and for conflicts of interest which made the Recording Academy eliminate most of its "secret" nominating committees in 2021. The Weeknd and other artists had protested changes and threaten to boycott the Grammys.

"The Weeknd Ends Yearslong GRAMMYs Boycott with Surprise Performance"  -CBC News

Now, the top five in each category are put into Finals where they each have a chance to obtain a Grammy award. The top five are the nominees, essentially. The general categories have the top eight, excluding Producer of the Year, Non-Classical, and Songwriter of the Year which have five nominees.

Great, now we have all of the nominees. The Final Round of voting determines the Winner of the awards. In the show, each name gets called up with a snippet of their work to show every nominee. Behind the scenes, Academy voting members vote in up to ten categories across three genre fields and then up to six categories in the general field to determine the winners. And voilà, we have our winners.

Having had run through the Recording Academy's process in choosing every Grammy winner, now we can figure out the validity to it. The Weeknd posing a boycott against the award show is just skimming the surface of the many qualms people and artists have had in the past. And the Academy had worked hard in actually fixing those issues as well. But, concerning the now is what interests me. Is the way the process works now somewhat valid in the way it chooses the very best artists and music from the year?