JPF Home Page Forums General Messages Mentor Questions Forum Grammy Process

Who can tell me what the process is for getting a Grammy nomination? I know you have to join NARAS, which cost $100. Anyone know the next step. Who gets to vote? Should the artist join, or songwriter, or both? I've looked on the site, but the info is very vague.

Sorry, Donna:

I don't have a clue. My best guess is that "real people" like us don't stand a chance, even if we register as "Rockstars!"

Most of these things are tightly controlled by a "board of snobs" who would not stoop to even considering a humble songwriter
or fledgling artist... LOL! At least it costs nothing to dream.

All my best,

----Dave

Yes Donna. You join for $100. Then you get another NARAS member to "nominate you." Boom, you are nominated. Now there are about thirty thousand nominations a year, most absolutely meaningless. There are around 3000 categories, but only about 30 that you ever hear of. And for those, you have to have a lot of money, a campaign" around you, (spending a lot of money) and sales and fan base. Tends to weed things out very quickly.

MAB

You mean for $100 and a couple of beers for another member, I get to call myself "Grammy nominated?" It's almost worth doing, just for a laugh.

Gavin,

Technically that is true. It is how a lot of people get away with saying "Grammy nominated artist". But whether the nomination is ACCEPTED by the panels that pick the categories, is another thing. Like I said, there are thousands of categories and tens of thousands of nominations. But only a few really are important.

It is probably a better idea to spend one's time on learning to write songs, getting with people that can do something with those songs, building an audience and meeting the demand of that audience. That would actually MEAN something. A "Grammy Nomination" on an non-existing category about something no one cares about really means nothing.

MAB

Almost like buying prestige. Sound impressive but means little.

I guess Dreams Are Free ...
But nothing else is.
Don't waste your money. I'd rather give it to a Homeless Family.
Take the $100 and go to the Nearest Church that helps feed the homeless and give the money to them....
The Songwriting Contests are a Great Money Making Business and they are great Entrepreneurs but it's a Huge Scam perpetrated against unsuspecting Wannabee Songwriters. I've wasted money on those contests when I was younger and naïve and could sure use that money now when I need to eat....
Very Sad Indeed...

Marc

Thanks for the clarity and the reality concerning this.
I've seen or heard "grammy nominated artist" promoted several times and wondered how this or that person could be so unknown but grammy nominated.

Martin

Martin,

It is actually a little weird. I was a NARAS member a few years ago, and did get those big packages of CD's, information, etc, for the big artists and categories. But you would also get these multi page sheets that had all these obscure, weird categories. Those of course, I would skip. I really didn't care to vote on "Best World Song played on Hammer Dulcimer and Zither". And there are all kinds of stuff like that. They do have to go through panels and many of them, you have to be on those panels to vote for them, kind of like the Oscars, where actors vote for actors, directors for directors etc, then the entire membership voting on BEST PICTURE.

I know several people who have won them, and a few nominated for those weird categories. Some of the winners get CERTIFICATES, and not the little statue. My friend and Co-writer, Wood Newton won for producing, and the studio, THE PARLOR, owned by my publishers, Larry Sheridan and Robin Ruddy, won for "THE BEST OF STEPHEN FOSTER" which won for "Best Folk album" in 2003. I think.

Other's I have known are RICHARD LEIGH, a co-writer and friend who wrote "DON'T IT MAKE MY BROWN EYES BLUE" where he won SONG OF THE YEAR. He has that one in his living room with the collar of his dog, that he wrote the song about.
The other one was from a friend, Rosie Roselle, who was a very famous Southern Gospel Quartet singer. His group, the "MASTERS V" won for Gospel event of the year. On that one, I thought I broke the trophy one time, when I went to pick it up for a commercial we were shooting at the time. The little megaphone came off in my hand and I FREAKED OUT!! When I sheepishly went up to tell him, he laughed and said "That thing broke right after we got it. We've been using it for a doorstop."
They are really poorly made.

At any rate, that is about it. Anyone can be nominated. But getting to the "real categories" are another thing. There are around 27,00-0-35,000 NARAS members worldwide and I can BET YOU that a LOT OF THOSE PEOPLE joined just to nominate some friend or have someone nominate them so that they can say "hey, I'm a GRAMMY NOMINEE.

Not as prestigious as you would think.

MAB

As a voting member of NARAS it works like this:

1. Anyone can join NARAS, but not everyone can vote in the Grammys.

2. How do I become a voting member? You have to have a certain amount of releases available on major streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music, etc... and still be putting out music recently. Can't be from like 5 years ago and then nada. Then if you meet that requirement they will vet you to make sure you're not lying. When they approve you, you will be notified.

3. Any music during a the calendar year of roughly October 2016 to September 2017 would be eligible for submission to the 2018 Grammy awards.

4. You can submit your own music. No, that does not mean your nominated. Just means you're put into the first round voting process. Any artist stating they're Grammy nominated by being included in the first round of voting - is LYING.

5. After the first round of voting, which does contain thousands of songs/albums. They tabulate all the votes and then go on to round two.

6. Round two is where you're officially nominated, so to speak. There are about 30 categories of music and production awards, though last year it was reduced with a couple of categories getting consolidated (there are not 3000 categories). If you make it to this 2nd round, then an artist, writer, producer, etc could say they're Grammy nominated.

7. Voting in round two is done by special ballot, and it has to be signed by the member who is voting.

In the end getting a Grammy nomination can be exciting. It is an arduous process and requires a lot of work. Popularity does help. Knowing a lot of voting members also helps. But getting into the first voting round does not equal getting to call yourself Grammy nominated. There is no voting member that can say "you're nominated".

ps. - All Grammy listening for voting in round two for the past 7 years or so has been via online streaming - not CDs.

There ya go. Nothing to it.

This year, there are some changes as well. Voting will now be done online. Another change is if you have less than 33% of playing time on an album, you will only get a certificate and not a full fledged trophy.

Your numbers are off, but you have the gist right.

Even though technology is available to make it possible, the Grammy's still do not require voters to listen to any (let alone ALL) of the eligible music in the round to pick winners. So it is solely a popularity contest. In the past labels all signed up their entire company staffs and then handed out the ballots on who to vote for, even in cases where their company had multiple nominees. I heard many stories of corruption and vote trading (one example was where two competing labels traded votes against their own artists so that each could secure the votes for the key artist category their promotional department most needed for business purposes. I had all the names, but don't feel like getting sued. I had multiple sources who were board members at NARAS (now GRAMMYS) who gave me quite an inside look behind the process. It is one reason I started our awards, to at least offer an awards where people had to hear the music before they could cast a vote that counted. If we have voters in our last round who just vote without listening to all the nominees, their vote is eliminated. And we have huge lists of nominees and categories. We give equal time and support to every category at our awards show which is why it's private and it lasts over 5 hours. But it's fair and honest and free run by volunteers so it's not bought or corrupted (though people have tried in many ways) and though I sometimes hate the choices the judges make (i.e. songs I love most rarely win) I am thrilled that the deserving winner wins based on who liked their music.

Brian

I figured someone would come on here with the information. I was a member a long time ago and to tell you the truth I don't even remember why I joined. They used to have this big outdoor party, with all the top bands, and performers, kind of a street festival thing that everyone in town who was anybody would go to. I believe they had booths there to join and reduced rates, like $35 bucks or something. I'm pretty sure that is why I joined. I think one of those parties were where people were telling me that "you could nominate someone and they could nominate you..." stuff. Was all the joke going around because everyone was going to be "Grammy Nominees."

Over the next few years I would get those packages, invitations, special deals on car rentals and that sort of stuff, but I mostly looked at it and threw it away. To be honest, I've always HATED AWARDS. Used to watch the Oscars with my mother but that got really boring and when George C. Scott turned his down in 1970 because of it "being a big meat show" I lost my interest in the Oscars. I may have watched three or four parts of Grammy's over the years, but again, most of that was always a viewing party in someone's house who had a friend or someone they knew up for an award. And most of those times I was flirting with some hot girls at the party. Can't ever remember watching a whole one of those. And as time went by the people you wanted to win, never did and a bunch of people you never heard of did win.

I always figured if I actually was nominated or won any one, I would pull a "Woody Allen" and not even show up. I'd be playing a show somewhere, and do some kind of remote, "Wave at the camera" deal.

So I just sort of had them all in the background of my mind. The only "Awards" I was ever interested in was the "awards" when people bought your music or came to your shows. The rest never meant much of anything. When one of my songs, "LESS IS MORE", was nominated for an award called "the Telly" again, I didn't pay a lot of attention. Until the award arrived via UPS at my door and was REALLY heavy. Is a cool award, but I don't even know that much about that organization. It was entered by the director of the video. Got some hits on YOU TUBE, and is still pretty cool for a mantel piece. But of course by the time we go that I was no longer actually an "artist.

So if I got some details wrong here, sorry glad you guys straightened them out. Awards have never been of much interest to me, so glad someone is keeping up with them. Good luck on your's Brian.

MAB

http://exclaim.ca/music/article/katy_perry_slams_fake_awards_shows

tl;dr: "All the awards shows are fake," she said. "And all the awards that I've won are fake." Going on to explain that they don't represent the audience and real fans, she added, "They're constructs."

Pretty much dead on. Most are voted by industry insiders, and rarely reflect what the actual AUDIENCE wants. It's why really obscure movies, television, shows, artists, and songs end up winning awards and leaving every one in the "real world"scrambling to find out who in the world it is. A lot of the movies are "art house" movies, that never even get widespread distribution. Same is with music. Certain "media darlings" will catch on in all the society columns and "inside baseball" conversations. And those are the ones who move up. Some are nominated and win because the insiders want to pump up their overseas rentals.

But pretty much all awards are simply that industry patting itself on the back and now being used as a political platform for entertainment industry people to make political speeches. A four hour ego filled dog and pony show.

MAB

Aw, Yes,
Can't remember his name but if you registered a song or songs for copyright or by some other means you could enter his Awards Contest for about 100 dollars. AND, you could win a Plaque to put on your wall that may have cost 5 or 10 dollars and Eureka you were an Awards Winner! I got stuff from him telling me I could enter my songs. Never bought the Snake Oil or sent any money. True, I think "Awards" Shows are a lot of Hooey.

In the interests of efficiency, I am going to create my own awards and present them to myself. That way I can cut out the middle man and get to keep the $100 I'm going to charge myself to enter.

There are currently 30 fields (General, pop, gospel, classical, etc. which JPF calls "Genres") and 83 categories within those fields. (most of theirs are for "performances" with only a handful of songwriter categories. JPF has 60 Song and 75 Album categories plus all of the "of the year" categories. And that's down from last time when we had over 100 album and 80 song categories plus the "of the year" winners.

Give me one of those. Please. I'd like to win one award in my life for a song.

I can do better than that, Martin. I hereby award you the Sinclair Lifetime Achievement Prize for Music. Congratulations.

I think the price of $100 is too expensive.why not choose anothe option?