Grammy's Biggest Night

Music’s Biggest Night: The Annual GRAMMY Awards Each year, the National Academy of Recording Arts and Science recognizes the most influential music-makers of the year through its GRAMMY Awards (RoBair 36). It recognizes categories such as: albums, singles, videos, and other multimedia works, by celebrating a range of artists with styles as diverse as Americana and Rap, Bluegrass and Classical, Gospel and Electronica (RoBair 37). The Grammy’s are for recognition of amazing works. Hailed as “Music Biggest Night”, the GRAMMY Awards is known throughout the world as the most prestigious award. The first GRAMMY Awards were held in 1959 to recognize outstanding achievements in the music industry (Chang 8). It was held in the Grand Ballroom of the
The night was on numerous accounts a significant success (Chang 8). It was said to be the only true peer-determined honor awarded by and to artists and technical professionals for excellence in artistic achievement and technical proficiency without regards to album sales or positions of that time (Chang 8). The GRAMMY’s ensured understanding and appreciation of music of artists, and contributed to their recordings and the future generation of music by acknowledging great performances throughout the year. Winning a gramophone was one of the major accomplishments artists and producers looked for. Ella Fitzgerald was the first GRAMMY Award winner. She won Best Female Vocal Performance and Best Jazz Individual Performance in 1959. The nomination process was the interesting part. There were 83 categories to choose from. Out of those 83, the winners were always chosen by other artists, producers, and multi-media persons, who thought another artist was worthy of the award. After being evaluated by The National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, the winners would be announced at a dinner months before. The awards were presented to the artists for their work in the previous year of 1958 with categories such as: Best Album of the Year , Best Solo Performance, Best Comedy Recording , and more, but by 1993 the Best Comedy Award and several others were
The show has now been broken down into three different parties: The Pre-Pre Party, The Pre-Party, and The Party (Greenblatt 16). The show has become a major goal for artist everywhere. While the show was changing it was also changing people’s lives, giving unknown, unsponsored talent a chance to be seen before the world for their talents as well. This ranged from the 55th GRAMMY Awards when Sophia Grace, a 6 year old, who sang Katy Perry in her home wearing a tutu, was chosen to host the Red Carpet event in 2013 when the show reeled in 28.4 million people, the second most since 1993.Or maybe back into the past when the Fresh Prince who the first Rap gramophone in 1988 at the 31st GRAMMYs, shocking a nation that hadn’t ever seen a rapper win an award for the 30 years that the GRAMMYS were up and running. The 2nd GRAMMYs also marked a first in history as the first GRAMMYs to be televised on a news network (Maughan 27). The 54th Grammy had as many as 39.4 million viewers that year due to the Tribute of the beloved and previously deceased Whitney Houston