More so than any other major award, the Grammy's seem to ruin their credibility with every passing year. In hoping someone from NARAS reads these boards, what would you suggest they do to fix the grammy's?

Here are a couple of my suggestions:

1) Whittle down the categories to a select few. Having over 90 categories is excessive and makes the award easily attainable, unlike the Oscars where winning is a challenge. Does anyone really care about the difference between categories like "Best R&B Album" and "Best Contemporary R&B Album?" Just combine the two! Hell, even combine Record and Song of the Year.

While they are at it, get rid of all the non-musical categories (Spoken Word, Comedy, etc).

Winning an Oscar or a Tony seems like you join an exclusive club. With so many categories and winners, the Grammy's does not.

2) Have a normal eligibility period! Too many important and high profile albums are released in the fall and winter to not be eligible. Worst is when great albums have to wait an entire year to be nominated (when their impact has faded).

Any others?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: clementine,

It would be dumb to combine Record of the Year and Song of the Year into one category. SOTY is their songwriters award which is a very important award!

But I definitely agree with you on Contemporary R&B Album and R&B Album. Those should be combined.

I agree with the excessive award category.
it seems like any idiot with an album or a single could get a grammy now. It's one thing to try and cover an entire range of music but there's a line.

There is no need to "fix" the Grammys. The awards show is just fine the way it is.

quote:

2) Have a normal eligibility period! Too many important and high profile albums are released in the fall and winter to not be eligible. Worst is when great albums have to wait an entire year to be nominated (when their impact has faded).

huh? They're eligible the following year. If they didn't want their impact to fade, they shouldn't release in the Fall. The reason they do that is to capitalize on the holidy sales, so, those initial high sales help that cd get recognition, if it's a good enough cd, it'll stand the test of time and still get a nomination.


.

quote:

Originally posted by clementine:
While they are at it, get rid of all the non-musical categories (Spoken Word, Comedy, etc).

If this is so, then the Golden Globes, Oscars, etc. need to get rid of any music categories.

It would be stupid to combine Record of the Year and Song of the Year. Both categories have different criterias and have been around since the start of the Grammys. Combining both would defeat the purpose of both.

I never understood why they split the R&B Album category into two during an era where music is incredibly weak. Best Contemporary R&B Album usually only have 30 entries, while R&B Album is well over 60 entries. They should have split that category into two years before. But oh well.

The only folks who really care that much about the Grammys are the Grammy heads like us.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: musicluva123,

quote:

Originally posted by musicluva123:
The only folks who really care that much about the Grammys are the Grammy heads like us.

Amen!

quote:

Originally posted by clementine:
More so than any other major award, the Grammy's seem to ruin their credibility with every passing year. In hoping someone from NARAS reads these boards, what would you suggest they do to fix the grammy's?

Here are a couple of my suggestions:

1) Whittle down the categories to a select few. Having over 90 categories is excessive and makes the award easily attainable, unlike the Oscars where winning is a challenge. Does anyone really care about the difference between categories like "Best R&B Album" and "Best Contemporary R&B Album?" Just combine the two! Hell, even combine Record and Song of the Year.

While they are at it, get rid of all the non-musical categories (Spoken Word, Comedy, etc).

Winning an Oscar or a Tony seems like you join an exclusive club. With so many categories and winners, the Grammy's does not.

2) Have a normal eligibility period! Too many important and high profile albums are released in the fall and winter to not be eligible. Worst is when great albums have to wait an entire year to be nominated (when their impact has faded).

Any others?

I appreciate and agree with many of your opinions, but I take issue and disagree with one - the eligibility period. I think it's fine. Changing it to favor artists that release albums in the fall-winter months wont make things any MORE fair.

You say it's not fair to the Oct/Nov/Dec albums because their impact has faded by nomination time. But some albums come out at the beginning or middle of the year and may be slow burners that don't reach the height of their popularity until later.

So, I don't think there is any way to have an eligibility period everyone will agree upon.

If an album or a song is compelling or innovative enough, it will stand the test of a one-year period.

I definitely agree with combining Cont. R&B and R&B Album into one category, among other changes.

The thing here is that you cannot compare the other award shows with the Grammys: they're rewarding other forms of art with different criteria. This is music we're talking about and it cannot be regarded in a generalized way. For example: Can you guys imagine if we only had "Best Female Vocal Performance" regardless of genre? Then we would have the Barbra Streisands and Celine Dions of the world with 25 Grammys each.

I think the Grammys should "think outside the box", be more in tune with what's going on in music in the eligibility year, and be bolder with their choices of nominees and especially winners. "Raising Sand" (remember it? It won Album of The Year in 2009!) might be a fine, well crafted album, with respected artists (Krauss/Plant), but I don't see its groundbreaking element or in what extent it can represent 2008 musically speaking.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: DJWolff,

One piece of advice: um, give out awards.

It's an awards show not a concert.

Valid points, but doesn't everyone think its time the Grammy's addressed some of their lingering issues?

At least with other award shows when people like us complain, they take notice. For example, AMPAS expanding best picture to ten or the VMA's feeling the heat from previous subpar shows and returning to their roots. The Grammy's, from what I have seen, have not done this at all.

Every year its the same complaints (veterans winning for lackluster work, too many categories, odd submissions rules/placement, etc) and nothing really changes.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: clementine,

1. Combine the Best R&B Album & Best Contemporary R&B Album.

2. Combine some of the Gospel categories.

3. Expand the blues and jazz categories.

4. Stop giving out sympathy Grammies.

I don't think it's nothing to complain about. Besides I rather see more awards giving out during the telecast than performances. I think the award presentation/speeches should be memorable like the Oscars. Maybe, the committee that selects the 4 general field nominees and winners might need to be upgraded due to the same stuff winning almost every year.

Otherwise, I don't think we can complain about the genre fields. 1000s of peers vote so whatever gets nominated gets nominated.

HELL NO to them combining Contemporary R+B Album and R+B Album. There a reason why they are seperated. Contemporary R+B Artists like Beyonce,Usher,Ne-Yo will win for more Contemporary Music and R+B/Soul Artists like Alicia,John,Maxwell will win for more Neo-Soul/R+B Music.

I would have multiple Blue Ribbon Panels (maybe like 15-20 Members) per main genre (GF, Pop, Rock, R&B, Rap, Country). These 20 or so voters will gather and SELECT 10-15 tracks/albums through debate and discussion that they feel should be nominated per category within that genre.

All other NARAS members should be able to vote on the GF and ONE genre from the selected tracks/albums. Ideally, if you're a country artist, you will choose to vote on country, or if your speciality is gospel, you choose gospel (that way you don't have people who don't know squat about rap, for instance, voting in rap). If you're into multiple genres, you just gotta pick one. I'm not sure if this is how it already works.

Voting would consist of ranking your top 5, in order.

To avoid biases (i.e. friends voting for friends biases), I would take age into consideration, and take a sample of votes. For instance, if 1000 people vote, but 500 of those are greater than 50 years old, obviously music that caters to them will be favored and skew the results. I say if 1000 people vote, then take a sample of 500 total, for instance: 100 voters from ages 15-24, 100 from 24-34, 100 from 35-44, 100 from 45-54, and 100 from 55+. Or something like that; not exactly that. Basically, just break it down and make it more representative of all music types within the genre (My assumption is that age, to some significant extent, plays a role in what people vote for - be it music they like or peers - probably two of the same).

For all other genres, I say a specialized Blue Ribbon Panel is not needed. General members who chose that as their genre of interest can just do the Top-5 ranking vote, and the top scorers are nominated.

To choose the winners, I would do the same genre-choosing, age breakdown-consensus method after all votes are in. Whoever has the most points (or however you choose to score it) wins!

That might just be complete f-ckery but, you never know, it might work - just an idea.

I actually like Fighting4Justice's idea. That would work perfectly!

I don't think it would matter what system they used. We'd complain anyway!

Everyone has different tastes and different measures of quality. Most people assume the BIG names and sellers should win or be nominated. Then when something unknown or less popular is nominated, everyone wants to scream and cry when they have never even listened to the material.

I guess it would depend what your biggest pet peeve is. Mine is favorites always winning, and old fogies winning when they really don't deserve to (IF they deserve it, it's another story).

I think the mix vote with difft age blocks is cool, though.