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Grammys

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Celine Dion is opening up about her surprise appearance at the Grammys earlier this year, which marked the singer’s first appearance since being diagnosed with the rare neurological disorder Stiff Persons Syndrome in late 2022.
In a video with Vogue France, in which Dion recounts memories she associates with some of her favorite fashion moments of her career (including singing “My Heart Will Go On” at the Academy Awards and performing at the 2017 Billboard Music Awards), she also recalls her experience at the Grammys in February.

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“It was very nerve-racking, but at the same time, a big honor,” Dion told the outlet. “That magic, that excitement. To see the fans, to see the crowd, to see show business again.” She added: “It took a lot, a lot out of me. But my son, René Charles, RC, came and gave me his support.”

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Dion also addressed one of the most-talked-about moments from the evening, when Dion presented Taylor Swift the Grammy for album of the year for Midnights. Swift drew criticism for seemingly ignoring Dion while accepting her Grammy onstage.

“To present the award, the album of the year, to Taylor Swift, it was an honor because she’s having the time of her life and I’m the one who’s presenting it to her. But it’s always very, very touching when you have a standing ovation,” Dion said.

Though Swift garnered backlash in the moment, photos from backstage seemed to tell a different story, as one image depicted Swift and Dion posing together and smiling, with Swift hugging Dion.

In Dion’s Vogue France cover story, the five-time Grammy winner noted that she was honored to be in the spotlight for Vogue France at age 55.

“I’m very proud that, at 55, I’ve been asked to reveal my beauty,” Dion said. “But what is beauty? Beauty is you, it’s me, it’s what’s inside, it’s our dreams, it’s today. Today, I’m a woman who is feeling strong and positive about the future. One day at a time.”

Dion previously had to postpone her tour dates for 2023 due to her diagnosis, and says her plans for returning to performing are vague at the moment.

“I’ve been saying to myself that I’m not going back, that I’m ready, that I’m not ready,” Dion said. “As things stand, I can’t stand here and say to you: ‘Yes, in four months.’ I don’t know. … My body will tell me. On the other hand, I don’t just want to wait. It’s morally hard to live from day to day. It’s hard, I’m working very hard, and tomorrow will be even harder. Tomorrow is another day, but there’s one thing that will never stop, and that’s the will. It’s the passion. It’s the dream. It’s the determination.”

Beyoncé and Taylor Swift will probably find themselves going head-to-head in one or more categories when the nominations for the 67th annual Grammy Awards are announced later this year. Beyoncé is a lock to be nominated for album of the year for March’s Cowboy Carter. Swift is also likely to be nominated in that category […]

As has been widely critiqued here and elsewhere, Beyoncé has yet to win album of the year. She was previously nominated for I Am…Sasha Fierce in 2010 (lost to Taylor Swift’s Fearless), Beyoncé in 2015 (lost to Beck’s Morning Phase), Lemonade in 2017 (lost to Adele’s 25) and Renaissance in 2023 (lost to Harry Styles’ Harry’s House). The fact that she lost to a white artist in each case has not escaped notice.On “Sweet Honey Buckiin’,” a track on the new album, Beyoncé addresses her album of the year (AOTY) track record. “A-O-T-Y, I ain’t win/ I ain’t stuntin’ ’bout them,” she raps. “Take that s—t on the chin/ Come back and f—k up the pen.”
In accepting an honorary award on the Grammy telecast on Feb. 4, Jay-Z “went there” and bluntly addressed her losses.
Looking at his wife, who was standing in the audience, he said, “I don’t want to embarrass this young lady, but she has more Grammys than everyone and never won album of the year. So even by your own metrics, that doesn’t work. Think about that. The most Grammys, never won album of the year. That doesn’t work.”
He then doubled down by saying, “When I get nervous, I tell the truth.”
Jay’s calling out the Grammys, right there on the Grammy stage, was a moment of high drama. Never mind that many other artists with large numbers of Grammys have never won album of the year, including Jay himself (24), Kanye West (also 24), Vince Gill (22) and Bruce Springsteen (20).
Because of all the attention Beyoncé’s repeated losses for album of the year have received, Recording Academy voters may feel unspoken pressure to finally give her the big one. It will be hard for voters to be totally objective when they have so much Grammy history on their minds, but that’s how it often works with awards.
Should Bey win for Cowboy Carter, it would be her first win on her fifth try. No one else in Grammy history has ever won for the first time on their fifth nomination in the category. Seven artists won for the first time on their third nod – Frank Sinatra (who received two nods in the Grammys’ first year), The Beatles, Whitney Houston, Steely Dan, Ray Charles, Dixie Chicks and Beck.
If Beyoncé finally wins, Sting, Kanye West, Lady Gaga and Kendrick Lamar will remain as the only artists to go 0-4 as lead artists for album of the year. Sting’s tally includes the final studio album by The Police. Gaga’s includes her second collab album with Tony Bennett. The tallies for West and Lamar include just solo studio albums. (Lamar’s tally does not count the Black Panther soundtrack, which was also nominated, but on which he was credited as a featured artist, not the lead artist.)
Why has Beyoncé’s 0-4 track record in this category attracted so much more attention than these four other artists’ identical records? Discuss amongst yourselves.

As Jay-Z pointed out at the Grammys in February, Beyoncé has been nominated for album of the year four times but has never won — despite the fact that she’s the awards show’s winningest artist of all time, taking home 32 trophies from 88 nominations. On the new Billboard Pop Shop Podcast (listen below), Katie […]

The heartbeat of Korean pop music will pulsate through the halls of the Grammy Museum as it embarks on a multi-year celebration of the global phenomenon by spotlighting two trailblazing acts.
To kick off the new initiative, Billboard can exclusively reveal that the Grammy Museum will present KQ ENT. (ATEEZ & xikers): A Grammy Museum Pop-Up for a limited time beginning next month.

Inside the museum’s third-floor red carpet gallery, the pop-up exhibit will feature boy bands ATEEZ and xikers, which are under the home of quickly rising K-pop agency and management label KQ Entertainment.

The exhibit promises an immersive experience for fans featuring outfits and props throughout both groups’ careers. One exhibition highlight includes props and the main outfits worn in ATEEZ’s “Crazy Form” music video, the lead single from their 2023 album THE WORLD EP.FIN: WILL, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in December and has earned 278,000 equivalent album units in the U.S. to date, according to Luminate.

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Also, xikers will feature the attire from the music for “We Don’t Stop,” the single from their latest EP, HOUSE OF TRICKY: Trial and Error which marked another chart triumphant for KQ Ent. when it debuted at No. 73 on the Billboard 200 earlier this month with 13,000 equivalent album units in its first week. Fans can also look forward to other props, outfits and mementos from different KQ projects including the look xikers member JUNGHOON wore for the band’s performance video of “TRICKY HOUSE” off their 2023 debut HOUSE OF TRICKY : Doorbell Ringing.

To date, ATEEZ has earned 1.49 million total equivalent album units in the U.S. to date since their October 2018 debut. Meanwhile, xikers has earned 70,000 total equivalent album units in the U.S. so far as they approach their one-year anniversary on March 30.

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“It’s an honor to have pieces from our latest music release displayed at the Grammy Museum where so many wonderful artists have left a piece of their musical history,” ATEEZ says in a statement. “There are so many elements involved in the process of our music creation and we’re excited to be able to share some of it through our music video outfits and props.”

xikers adds, “We’re so grateful for the opportunity to have our pieces displayed alongside our labelmate and seniors ATEEZ, as well as so many amazing artists that we’ve grown up listening to. Though it’s only been a little over a year since our debut, we’re so happy to take part in this opportunity at the Grammy Museum and hope that everyone has fun looking at all the interesting outfits and props that have helped create the xikers world in the music video of our latest release.”

Kyu Wook Kim, CEO of KQ Entertainment, also made a rare public statement as part of the milestone.

“The global spread of K-pop is truly remarkable and it is a great honor to see ATEEZ and xikers represent K-pop music at the Grammy Museum,” the CEO and longtime K-pop executive shares. “Witnessing our artists’ hard work and dedication being recognized on such a large scale by the Grammy Museum is truly a privilege and fills us with so much pride. We aim to continue to do our best to work with our artists to break boundaries in music on the global stage with K-pop.”

The Grammy Museum also shared more insight into curating its two-year K-pop commitment.

“Korean pop music is one of the greatest phenomena in the history of recorded music and culture,” says Michael Sticka, President/CEO of the Grammy Museum. “The Grammy Museum plans to celebrate the world of K-pop, its much-deserved success, and worldwide chart-breaking artists by curating dedicated exhibits and programming over the next two years. We look forward to launching this series with exclusive outfits and props from xikers and ATEEZ.”

KQ ENT. (ATEEZ & xikers): A Grammy Museum Pop-Up is scheduled to open on April 10 and run until June 10, launching just ahead of ATEEZ’s debut at Coachella 2024 as the first K-pop boy band to perform at the Indio festival.

More information about ticket reservations and the event can be found at the Grammy Museum website.

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The Grammy Hall of Fame is set to return this year following a two-year hiatus in which the Academy reconsidered the Hall, which was formed in 1973 but has in recent years been overshadowed by the Library of Congress’ much newer National Recording Registry (which dates back to 2002). The Recording Academy is making two […]

The producers of the 1984 Grammys knew they needed to book a performance by Michael Jackson, who in 1983-84 was hotter than anyone had been in pop music since The Beatles in 1964-65. The need was made even clearer when the Grammy nominations were announced in early January, and Jackson set a new record with 12 nods.

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There was just one problem: Jackson didn’t want to do it. As Ken Ehrlich, who was producing the show for the fifth year (of a remarkable 40-year run) put it in his 2007 book At the Grammys!, “Even after his record nominations, Michael hadn’t said yes to performing, and without him, it could be wildly embarrassing.”

In an attempt to stave off that embarrassment, Jackson’s manager arranged what Ehrlich called “a very quiet, discreet meeting at his home for us to talk about what we wanted to do. We sat, Michael barely talking, and when he did, directing his words to the manager, and I knew that we were up against it. No matter where we went, it wasn’t going to be satisfactory. I left very discouraged.”

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Ehrlich had allies who were trying to convince Jackson to do it. As Ehrlich wrote: “The people at Epic Records, Michael’s label, wanted him to perform. His father wanted him to perform. [His sister] Janet, with whom I was then working at [the TV series] Fame, talked to him about performing. But no matter what kind of pressure was applied, there was no budging Michael. He wasn’t going to do it. … Even Quincy Jones, a great friend of the Grammys, was unable to sway him, and we went into the Grammy show Michael-less.”

John Denver hosted the show that year, promising “a show so hot it’s going to pop if we don’t get right into it.” I was at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles that year covering the show for Billboard and remember it as a lively and entertaining show. A Jackson performance would have lifted the show even higher, but it did phenomenally well as it was. The show was seen by more than 51.67 million viewers – an all-time record for the Grammys that is unlikely to ever be broken.

Why was Jackson so resistant to performing on what was clearly shaping up to be his big night?

For one thing, he probably knew he didn’t need to perform to dominate the night. So, why take the risks that are in inherent in a live TV performance? (Taylor Swift may have made the same calculation when she declined to perform on this year’s ceremony.)

Also, Jackson may have been spooked by a widely reported accident that happened when he was filming a Pepsi commercial at the Shrine on Jan. 27. During a simulated concert, pyrotechnics accidentally set Jackson’s hair on fire, causing second-degree burns to his scalp.

In his book, Ehrlich suggested another reason: “And then we discovered that, as with other artists, he had felt mistreated in the past by the Grammy voting process, and this was his way of getting back.”

Jackson had indeed been underrecognized by Grammy voters. The Jackson 5 (and later The Jacksons) never won a Grammy. Jackson had never previously been nominated in a “Big Four” category – album, record and song of the year plus best new artist. Even the blockbuster Off the Wall was passed over for an album of the year nod. Jackson’s only Grammy victory to that point was a 1980 win for best R&B vocal performance, male for “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough.” So, he had a right to feel he hadn’t gotten his due from the Academy.

Jackson had also opted not to perform at the American Music Awards, which were also held at the Shrine (his home away from home that year) on Jan. 16. In his absence, Barry Manilow performed The J5’s “I’ll Be There.” Jackson had performed on the Motown 25: Yesterday, Today and Forever special which was taped on March 25, 1983. That was the show where Jackson moonwalked publicly for the first time during “Billie Jean” – a performance that brought him a Primetime Emmy nomination.

Jackson, who was 25 at the time – and as it turned out, halfway through his life – could not have been hotter than he was in 1984. His every move made news. The way it is with Swift now, it was with MJ back then, and he didn’t have a high-profile romance fueling the publicity flames.

Though Jackson didn’t perform on Grammy night, there were many cutaways to him, as he sat in the front row, accompanied by his date for the night, actress Brooke Shields; Emmanuel Lewis, the 12-year-old star of the hit sitcom Webster; and the legendary Jones, who produced Thriller (with Jackson credited as co-producer of three tracks). Lewis’ presence was an unspoken reminder that Jackson had also been a child star, landing his first No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 at age 11, fronting The Jackson 5.

Jackson dressed regally, as if seeking to live up to his preferred appellation, the King of Pop. (Writing in Rolling Stone decades later, Andy Greene took a less respectful tone, saying he looked like “the captain of the disco navy.”)

Near the top of the show, Denver explained that the big buzzwords of the past year had been “videos, Boy George and Michael…” Denver didn’t even need to finish the sentence. Fans in the audience screamed out the star’s last name.

Jackson won a record eight Grammys in 1984, seven for his work on Thriller and one for narrating a children’s recording, E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial. That’s one more than Paul Simon had won in 1971, the year of the first live Grammy telecast.

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Jackson won five of the eight awards on the telecast – including two in categories that are rarely presented on-air – producer of the year, non-classical and best recording for children. He and Jones were co-winners in those two categories, and in two other categories that Jackson won on the air that night – album and record of the year. So, the two men, who were 25 years apart in age and looked very much like father and son, made a lot of trips up the stage together.

Without a Jackson performance to trumpet, the producers had to get creative. They booked performances by all five of the nominees for best pop female vocal performance. That smart decision gave the show a thematic element that Jackson was not part of, which helped to broaden the show’s focus. It helped that the nominees in that category that year were exceptionally strong and varied.

Donna Summer had the first performance of the night with her terrific hit “She Works Hard for the Money,” which she performed wearing a pink waitress outfit. (She wore a similar outfit on the album cover and single sleeve.) It was a big production number and got the show off to a rousing start.

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Performances by the other four nominees in the category were sprinkled throughout the show. Bonnie Tyler sang her thundering power ballad “Total Eclipse of the Heart.” Linda Ronstadt, backed by Nelson Riddle and his orchestra, crooned “I’ve Got a Crush on You,” the 1928 Gershwin tune that was a highlight of What’s New, her 1983 hit collection of standards. Sheena Easton sang her trendy “Telefone (Long Distance Love Affair).” Irene Cara performed “Flashdance…What a Feeling,” which was so good you could forgive it for borrowing so heavily from the Summer hit playbook.

Four of these songs had been top 10 hits on the Billboard Hot 100. The exception was Ronstadt’s ballad, which was featured on an album that stunned the industry by spending five weeks at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 over the peak holiday sales period. The award went to Cara, who went on to win an Oscar for best original song on April 9 for co-writing the song.

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In an unfortunate development, the first three winners on the telecast were no-shows, because they were on tour, we were told – Sting for song of the year for “Every Breath You Take” (the only Big Three award Jackson didn’t win); The Police for best rock performance by a duo or group with vocal for Synchronicity; and Duran Duran for best video album for Duran Duran. (The fact that the latter category was presented on-air was a sign of the times. Two and a half years after MTV’s debut, video was driving the music business.)

Fortunately, Jackson and Jones were in the house to accept the fourth award of the night, producer of the year, non-classical, which was presented by Toto, the previous year’s winners in the category.

Jackson shared the spotlight on his five trips to the podium, calling up his sisters – Janet, then 17; La Toya, 27; and Rebbie, 33, as well as CBS Records president Walter Yetnikoff (“the best president of any record company,” Jackson said of the man who strong-armed MTV into adding the “Billie Jean” video). In a poignant moment, Jackson remembered R&B pioneer Jackie Wilson, who had died five weeks earlier at age 49. “Jackie Wilson was a wonderful entertainer. He’s not with us anymore, but Jackie, where you are, I’d like to say I love you and thank you very much.”

The 1984 Grammy telecast was just the second to run three hours. CBS had bumped the Grammys from two to three hours the year before so they could have extra time to mark their 25th anniversary. The show has run three hours (or more) ever since.

The 1984 show marked the first time in 12 years that the Academy presented lifetime achievement awards. They had probably stopped because of severe time constraints on the telecast, but now that they had more airtime to fill, they were able to resume this tradition. The 1984 honorees were rock pioneer Chuck Berry, then 57, and, posthumously, jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker and Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini.

Berry, who had blazed a trail for Jackson and other Black superstars of the modern era, performed his 1955 classic “Maybelline,” after which George Thorogood and Stevie Ray Vaughan performed “Roll Over Beethoven,” before all three teamed for “Let It Rock.” In his performance, Berry did his famous duckwalk. How great would it have been to have the duckwalk and the moonwalk on the same show?

Herbie Hancock performed his instrumental hit “Rockit.” The performance replicated the acclaimed video, which was directed by Kevin Godley and Lol Creme. As Ehrlich recounted in his book: “We located the original robots [that were featured in the video], worked on a system of making them work live (it had taken four days to tape the video) and it was far and away the performance of the show. The crowd loved it.” “Rockit” went on to receive a video of the year nod at the inaugural MTV Video Music Awards later that year.

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Wynton Marsalis, 22, performed both jazz and classical numbers, underscoring his versality. He was the first person to perform songs nominated in two different genres on the telecast. Marsalis wound up winning for both best jazz instrumental performance, soloist and best classical performance – instrumental soloist or soloists (with orchestra).

The show cut away twice to London where Boy George of Culture Club and Joan Rivers provided comic relief. In their first segment, they read the rules (an awards-show custom that seems to have fallen by the wayside). Rivers offered a humorous explanation for reading the rules: “Every one of the nominees out there should know why they lost out to Michael Jackson.”

Rivers’ jokes were topical, at least, including a reference to a MJ/Paul McCartney song that had topped the Hot 100 for six weeks in December 1983 and January 1984. “I am thrilled to be on a music show because I know very little about music. I thought the song ‘Say Say Say’ was Mel Tillis trying to do the National Anthem.”

In their second spot, Culture Club was awarded best new artist (over Eurythmics, among others). The presenters were Cyndi Lauper, the previous year’s winner, and Rodney Dangerfield. Boy George’s acceptance speech was an instant classic: “Thank you, America, you’ve got taste, style and you know a good drag queen when you see one.”

Cross-dressing was a recurring theme on the show. Annie Lennox was dressed as Elvis, complete with sideburns, for Eurythmics’ performance of “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This),” which had been a No. 1 hit on the Hot 100.

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Walter Charles, from the company of the Broadway smash La Cage Aux Folles, performed that show’s standout song, “I Am What I Am,” in full cross dress, joined by cast member Jamie Ross. The show’s stars Gene Barry and George Hearn did not make the trip to Los Angeles, a decision they may have regretted when they saw the ratings. La Cage went on to win the Tony for best musical on June 3.

Denver teamed with Floyd the Muppet (Jerry Nelson) of The Muppets to perform “Gone Fishin’” from their album Rocky Mountain Holiday, which was nominated for best recording for children (and lost to you-know-who).

Other performers on the telecast were Big Country (doing their pop/rock hit “In a Big Country”), The Oak Ridge Boys’ (the Hot Country Songs-topping “Love Song”), Phil Driscoll (the classic Christian hymn “Amazing Grace”) and Albertina Walker with the Pentecostal Community Choir (“Spread the Word”).

As is often the case with Grammy telecasts, the show honored the past, while looking to the future. Jones announced that year’s five inductions into the Grammy Hall of Fame, including such immortal hits as Glenn Miller & His Orchestra’s “In the Mood” and Hank Williams’ “Your Cheatin’ Heart.”

The Academy’s then-president Mike Melvoin held up a vinyl LP and then a shiny silver object and announced “This is the new compact disc.” Despite Melvoin’s enthusiastic pitch, CDs didn’t surpass LP sales until 1987 and didn’t surpass cassette tapes to become the top medium for music until 1991. Melvoin also announced a trustees award for the late composer and conductor Béla Bartók.

The show was not glitch-free. As Ehrlich relates in his book, Summer’s limo had stalled blocks away from the Shrine. Summer, who was set to perform the opening number, got out of the limo and hot-footed it to the venue. “She ran into the house, winded, about two minutes before the hard wall rose on the number,” Ehrlich remembered. “But it was a big score.”

Mickey Rooney (another former child star), who co-presented the award for best cast show album, hammed it up to the point that director Walter C. Miller asked Ehrlich “to go out onstage and pull him off, anything we could do to end this embarrassing moment.” In his book Ehrlich wrote, “To this day I can’t tell you whether Mickey was a little hammered or he’s just that way.”

Classical clarinetist Richard Stolzman, who was set to present the classical awards, had been ill-served by the accountants working the show: “He opened the envelope to find it empty, and vamped … until one of the accountants rushed out onstage to give him the right envelope,” Ehrlich remembered.

The glitches and Jackson’s decision not to perform were forgotten when the ratings came in.

Will the Grammys ever reach such a vast audience again? It’s highly unlikely. The only Grammy telecast that got anywhere close to the 51.67 million who tuned in in 1984 was the 2012 telecast, which attracted 39.9 million viewers. There were two main draws that year – a red-hot Adele, who won six awards, and Whitney Houston, who had died the previous afternoon. Viewers wanted to see how the Grammys would handle something they couldn’t possibly have foreseen.

Rewatching the 1984 telecast 40 years later, I was struck by how much the Grammys have changed. Back then, the show still attempted to cover all genres on the telecast, including jazz, classical and gospel. It still attempted to give on-air recognition to the winners of pre-telecast awards, something that became more difficult as the number of categories ballooned. There were 67 categories in 1984. There were 94 this year. And the show was not as fast-paced. Clip packages, showing the nominees in each category, went on much on much longer than they do now.

I was also struck by how many of the night’s biggest stars are no longer with us – Jackson, Denver, Summer and Cara, as well as Chuck Berry, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Albertina Walker and Walter Charles. I guess 40 years is a long time, though in some ways it seems like yesterday.

So, was Jackson right to decline to perform on the biggest night of his career? That’s impossible to answer, but here’s what Ehrlich wrote in his book, which was published two years before Jackson’s death: “To this day I wonder whether the show that he saw up on the stage that night made him feel as through he had missed the boat by not performing. On the other hand, he was to perform a few years later and give one of his greatest-ever television performances, so perhaps he was right in spurning the 1984 show since the Academy had done the same to him in previous years.”

Indeed, Jackson performed two songs – “The Way You Make Me Feel” and “Man in the Mirror” – on the 1988 Grammy telecast, which was held at Radio City Music Hall in New York. His performance that night will always stand as Exhibit A to anyone who wants proof of his artistry and command when he was at the peak of his powers.

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Harvey Mason jr. is having a very good month. On Feb. 4, as Recording Academy CEO, Mason oversaw the 66th annual Grammy Awards, which were well-received by critics and saw an uptick in ratings.
Ten days later, wearing his other hat, as a long-time music supervisor for film and TV, Mason saw the release of the film Bob Marley: One Love, on which he is credited as executive music producer, and for which he recorded and mixed the songs. The film has been No. 1 at the box office in its first two weeks, and is already one of the top 10 highest-grossing music biopics in history.

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Bob Marley, who died in 1981, has long been one of Mason’s favorites. “I grew up listening to his music,” Mason says. “When I was in college, he was probably one of my top five most played CDs. I loved his music, so the chance to work on this project, even though it was a big one, was something I talked a lot about, thought a lot about and ultimately decided it was something I couldn’t pass up.”

The film includes a generous amount of Marley music as well as other music from the period, such as punk and disco (the Bee Gees’ “You Should Be Dancing”). “It was a fruitful time in music, for sure,” Mason says. “The filmmakers [led by director Reinaldo Marcus Green] did an excellent job of showcasing everything that was happening around different genres and the music and the culture at that period.”

When Mason signed on as Recording Academy CEO, he insisted on being able to continue his outside music projects on his own time. He believes it makes him a better CEO. “Being involved in music and getting a chance to create and have that outlet is a huge value to me as an executive,” he says. “That’s my life – making things and creating, collaborating.

“Each feeds the other,” he continues. “I really think there’s a value in doing both.”

Mason, who became interim president and CEO on Jan. 16, 2020 and assumed the role of permanent CEO on May 13, 2021, is a master at compartmentalizing. “I do Academy business 18 hours a day and then I get a meal and get back to the studio at night and create until I fall asleep. … I’m giving a ton of focus to the Academy, but fortunately I’m able to still be creative. For me, that was really part of being able to do this role at the Academy – could I stay creative? Could I remain connected to music and working with artists, songwriters and producers? I thought it was very important for me to continue doing that.”

Mason quickly adds, “It’s also something that the search committee and the executive committee felt was a good thing. It wasn’t something that I had to negotiate. They said, ‘We love that you’re a creator; that you do this work and you’re still involved in creating music. We’ve never had a CEO like that.’”

Mason doesn’t have to clear each outside music project with the trustees, but stresses, “I think there’s a mutual understanding that I wouldn’t want to do something that takes away from my job at the Academy. But also, the Academy understands the value in having a creator in this position. So, there’s not a formalized process, but I’m very respectful of my role and my obligations that I’ve made to not just the board but also the music community.”

Before he became CEO, Mason received five Grammy nominations – three of them for his work in film and TV, on the soundtracks to Dreamgirls, Pitch Perfect 2 and Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert.

But he has taken himself out of Grammy contention as long as he is CEO. “I’ve committed to not putting my name on the ballot because I wouldn’t want my job at the Academy to influence how somebody viewed a project or voted for a project.”

But other people who work on those projects can submit their own names. “I don’t want to punish people that do great work. So, others can submit, I won’t submit and I will not be getting a nomination or win while I’m in this role.”

Mason has a different view about Recording Academy trustees competing for Grammys. This year, three current trustees won Grammys. Michael Romanowski won best immersive audio album for a deluxe edition of Alicia Keys’ 2004 album The Diary of Alicia Keys. J. Ivy won best spoken word poetry album for The Light Inside. P.J. Morton won best traditional R&B performance for “Good Morning” (featuring Susan Carol). All three had won previously in those categories. Some have questioned whether their high-profile involvement in the Academy gives them an unfair advantage in the voting.

“I think as long as all the processes are sacrosanct and pristine, which they are, it’s great to have relevant music makers being celebrated,” Mason says. “Having members of board being people at the top of their craft says a lot about who our board is.”

Asked if he can see a sensitivity to having current board members competing for Grammys, he replies, “I can understand people wanting to make sure that it’s fair, which I do believe that it is. I don’t think people are just voting for people because they’re on the board, or because they’re friends. Our voters listen and go through the ballot and vote for people they think are doing great work. Some of these people are going to be on our board. I would love to have as many people on our board as possible that are relevant and contemporary and doing work at the top of their game. I’d hate to see us become an Academy where we didn’t want people who were thriving and winning and succeeding in the music industry on our board.”

Mason’s current, three-year contract with the Academy runs through July 31. Mason won’t say what’s going to happen after that. “I don’t think either side has made a commitment yet or firm decision as to what’s going to take place after July,” he says.

Jay-Z criticized the Academy’s voting processes in accepting the Global Impact Award from the Black Music Collective on this year’s telecast. Billboard’s headline, typical of the way the speech was characterized in the media, read: “Jay-Z Calls Out Grammys Over Beyoncé’s Album of the Year Snubs During Acceptance Speech.”

What did Mason think of the speech? “I’ll just say that when someone that we respect speaks out you always are going to listen,” he said. “Jay is one of the most prolific, most talented and most influential people in our industry. We respect his art and we respect his opinion … We listen and we try to take it in as constructive criticism and get better from it.”  

02/26/2024

No song in Eilish’s lifetime has achieved this double victory, and none has achieved it since Finneas was 18 months old.

02/26/2024

This year’s nominees for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame range such Grammy mainstays as Mary J. Blige and Mariah Carey – who have tallied more than 70 nominations between them – to Eric B. & Rakim, who have never even been nominated.
The Rock Hall nominees were announced on Feb. 10. This year’s inductees will be announced in late April, with the ceremony set for this fall.

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Blige has received more nominations (37) and more awards (nine) than any of this year’s other Rock Hall contenders. Impressively, she has won in four different genres – R&B, gospel, pop and rap.

Carey may not exactly feel like Grammy royalty. At times, she has probably felt more like a Grammy piñata: She has been nominated in Big Four categories (album, record and song of the year plus best new artist) nine times – but has won in one of those marquee categories just once, when she won best new artist in 1991. Still, her five wins and 34 nominations constitute a formidable Grammy track record.

This year’s Rock Hall nominees include another Grammy winner for best new artist – Sade, which won in 1986 after Whitney Houston was ruled ineligible for having had prior releases – as well as two former nominees in that category: Cher (as part of Sonny & Cher, 1966) and Foreigner (1978).

Five of this year’s Rock Hall candidates have been nominated in the most prestigious Grammy category – album of the year. Kool & the Gang won as part of the multi-artist Saturday Night Fever soundtrack (1979), which included their track “Open Sesame.”

Carey has been nominated for that award three times – for Mariah Carey (1991), Daydream (1996) and The Emancipation of Mimi (2006). Peter Frampton, Dave Matthews Band and Blige have each been nominated for it once – for Frampton Comes Alive! (1977), Big Whiskey and the Groo Grux King (2010) and Good Morning Gorgeous (Deluxe) (2023), respectively.

Two of this year’s Rock Hall candidates have been nominated for producer of the year, non-classical – Carey (in tandem with Walter Afanasieff, 1992) and Mick Jones of Foreigner (in tandem with Robert John “Mutt” Lange, 1982, and in tandem with Billy Joel, 1991).

Jones was also nominated for song of the year for writing Foreigner’s “I Want to Know What Love Is,” a No. 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1985. Several other Rock Hall contenders had additional Grammy nominations on their own. Two won on their own: Matthews won the best male rock vocal performance in 2004 for his solo hit “Gravedigger,” while Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest won best dance recording in 2006 as the featured artist on The Chemical Brothers’ “Galvanize.”

Carey and Sade have each won Grammys in both pop and R&B, a tribute to their versatility.

Carey and Lenny Kravitz were 2024 Recording Academy Global Impact Award honorees. The awards were held on Feb. 1 at the third annual Recording Academy Honors presented by the Black Music Collective at the Fairmont Century Plaza in Los Angeles. (This year’s third recipient of that award, Jay-Z, managed to get his award on the Grammy telecast.)

The 2024 inductees will be decided by a voting body of 1,000+ “artists, historians and members of the music industry,” according to a press statement. This year’s induction ceremony returns to Cleveland, home of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame headquarters, this fall. For the second year in a row, the induction ceremony will stream live on Disney+. It will air on ABC at a later date, and will be available on Hulu the following day.

Here are this year’s Rock Hall candidates, ranked by how well they have fared at the Grammys over the years.

Grammy Royalty

Mary J. Blige

Nominations: 37; Wins: 9

Big Four nominations: 4

Mariah Carey

Nominations: 34; Wins: 5

Big Four nominations: 9

Ozzy Osbourne

Nominations: 12; Wins: 5

Big Four nominations: 0

Lenny Kravitz

Nominations: 9; Wins: 4

Big Four nominations: 0

Sade

Nominations: 9; Wins: 4

Big Four nominations: 1

Other Grammy Winners

Dave Matthews Band

Nominations: 11; Wins: 1

Big Four nominations: 1

Sinead O’Connor

Nominations: 8; Wins: 1

Big Four nominations: 1

Cher

Nominations: 7; Wins: 1

Big Four nominations: 2

Peter Frampton

Nominations: 5; Wins: 1

Big Four nominations: 1

Kool & the Gang

Nominations: 3; Wins: 1

Big Four nominations: 0

Never Won a Grammy, but Nominated

Jane’s Addiction

5 nominations

Big Four nominations: 0

A Tribe Called Quest

4 nominations

Big Four nominations: 0

Foreigner

3 nominations

Big Four nominations: 1

Oasis

2 nominations

Big Four nominations: 0

Never Even Nominated

Eric B. & Rakim