THE GRAMMY FAMILY

Congratulations to all the winners at last nights 51st GRAMMY AWARDS. I was thinking how significant it really was to win such a honor. So much goes on behind the scenes we have no idea about. The GRAMMYs recognize artistic and technical achievements rather than sales success. Award night at the GRAMMYs has as much to do with live performances as with who takes home the statuettes.

Every year, the Recording Academy gathers nominations for the GRAMMY^® Awards. Associate and voting members can nominate artists online or by mail, as can major and independent record labels who have registered with the Awards department. To be eligible, recordings must have been released in general commercial distribution in the United States between October 1 of the previous year and September 30 of the current year.

Once the Recording Academy receives the nominations, expert reviewers have to organize them. The only purpose is to sort each nomination into one of 31 musical fields, such as rap, country, jazz and rock. Understand the GRAMMYS recognize comedy, spoken word recordings and music videos as well. As the industry evolves, the Awards & Nominations Committee can also add fields or change the existing ones. The Academy Trustees must approve the changes.

After sorting the nominations, the Recording Academy mails ballots to its voting members. The purpose of this first round of voting is to select five nominees for each award. Members return their ballots to the independent accounting firm Deloitte, which tallies the votes.

The Recording Academy then distributes a second round of ballots to each voting member. This time, the member may vote for the four general categories and in a maximum of eight of the 31 fields. Deloitte tallies the votes and places the results in envelopes which remain sealed until the ceremony.

Most people associate the GRAMMY Awards with the televised awards show and its live performances. But the Awards cover far more categories than you see on TV. In addition to the most well-known awards like Song of the Year, the Recording Academy recognizes a wide range of musical accomplishments, down to album notes and package design. The Recording Academy presents most of these awards separately on the afternoon of the televised ceremony.

Regardless of whether they receive their award on live TV or earlier in the day, each winner gets a small statue of a gramophone. The GRAMMYs get their nickname from these statues. Hopefully you are refining your gift so your time will be coming soon to pick up your own GRAMMY!

Don't forget to come out and experience "I do Music" for yourself on the 1ST THURSDAY OF EVERY MONTH!




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