This feels a bit like saying the Grammys ignore almost all of the world. The Record and Album of the Year nominees are all American and Jon Baptiste is the only man to get a nom. The nominees are...
This feels a bit like saying the Grammys ignore almost all of the world. The Record and Album of the Year nominees are all American and Jon Baptiste is the only man to get a nom. The nominees are going to be popular artists from big markets. That's the only way anyone will have heard of them. The only problem here is that Sojaboy from 90 Day Fiance has never been nominated.
I wouldn't care if all of the nominated tracks and albums were from the US. It's a US award. However, if you are going to feature Africa, it makes sense to survey more than Nigeria and South...
I wouldn't care if all of the nominated tracks and albums were from the US. It's a US award. However, if you are going to feature Africa, it makes sense to survey more than Nigeria and South Africa.
However, since it is an american award, it makes sense to me that all nominations be in English and I don't know how big the English song market is in other African countries.
They have actually been trying to label it as less of a US award and the only requirements are that it is new and available physically or streaming in the US. But Nigeria has more than twice the...
They have actually been trying to label it as less of a US award and the only requirements are that it is new and available physically or streaming in the US. But Nigeria has more than twice the population of any other country and has the biggest entertainment industry, as far as I'm aware. South Africa has the #6 population (just over 25% of Nigeria), the number #3 nominal GDP (within 1% of #1), and the #1 GDP per capita (among countries that aren't super small). It's nearly inevitable that these countries would have all the nominations when the nominees for record/album overall are by artists like Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, and Miley Cyrus. I'm curious how many new records are even put out in those genres from other countries that they had listed.
Yeah this article is a bit lofty - this is the grammy's we're talking about - but NPR took the bait. 'Best African Performance' always was and always will be a way to accommodate the rise of...
Yeah this article is a bit lofty - this is the grammy's we're talking about - but NPR took the bait. 'Best African Performance' always was and always will be a way to accommodate the rise of Afrobeat in popular music while not having it infiltrate the older awards. It's really cute them listing a bunch of obscure African acts worthier of the prize, as though the grammy's even had them on their list.
It's also a tinge patronizing. Burna Boy is great, let him be Burna Boy.
This feels a bit like saying the Grammys ignore almost all of the world. The Record and Album of the Year nominees are all American and Jon Baptiste is the only man to get a nom. The nominees are going to be popular artists from big markets. That's the only way anyone will have heard of them. The only problem here is that Sojaboy from 90 Day Fiance has never been nominated.
I wouldn't care if all of the nominated tracks and albums were from the US. It's a US award. However, if you are going to feature Africa, it makes sense to survey more than Nigeria and South Africa.
However, since it is an american award, it makes sense to me that all nominations be in English and I don't know how big the English song market is in other African countries.
They have actually been trying to label it as less of a US award and the only requirements are that it is new and available physically or streaming in the US. But Nigeria has more than twice the population of any other country and has the biggest entertainment industry, as far as I'm aware. South Africa has the #6 population (just over 25% of Nigeria), the number #3 nominal GDP (within 1% of #1), and the #1 GDP per capita (among countries that aren't super small). It's nearly inevitable that these countries would have all the nominations when the nominees for record/album overall are by artists like Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo, and Miley Cyrus. I'm curious how many new records are even put out in those genres from other countries that they had listed.
A lot of Africa speaks French or Swahili or Arabic as trade languages along with more local languages. I think that's a big part of it also
Yeah this article is a bit lofty - this is the grammy's we're talking about - but NPR took the bait. 'Best African Performance' always was and always will be a way to accommodate the rise of Afrobeat in popular music while not having it infiltrate the older awards. It's really cute them listing a bunch of obscure African acts worthier of the prize, as though the grammy's even had them on their list.
It's also a tinge patronizing. Burna Boy is great, let him be Burna Boy.
Weird that the West African countries like Mali would get left out since music around that region is incredibly good.