Every year, controversies over racism and exclusion take over “Music’s Biggest Night.” Ahead of the 64th Grammy Awards ceremony, this post discusses the Recording Academy’s elitist take on music to better understand the racist and colonial prism through which we consume and celebrate art.

Discrimination in American music 

Today, the American music industry is at the core of the world of music. Since the introduction of ‘records’ in the early 20th century, the industry has shown racist tendencies. In 1920, the label OKeh Records launched a “race catalogue” to sell music performed by African American artists. During World War II, big band swing had grown expensive and Black musicians began performing in smaller improvisation bands, leading to the birth of rhythm & blues. While the term reflected a musical reality, it quickly took on the meaning of “Black”, replacing the “race” genre in Billboard’s sales charts in 1949. In the 1960s, “soul” became another synonym for Black as the genre grew in popularity. The first ceremony celebrating music excellence was created under these circumstances.

Sidelining Black artists

Black artists are made victims of this system built to keep them aside. Since the ceremony’s creation in 1959, only ten Black artists have won the Grammy for Album of the Year. This is one of the four main awards, along with Song of the Year, Record of the Year and Artist of the Year, which are characterised by their lack of genre specificity. Studies show that Black artists are less likely to win a main award than their white counterparts, regardless of popularity and success. This does not reflect their growing influence on popular music, as since 2017, hip-hop has been the highest-selling genre in the United States.

Racialising genres

This is where racialised genres come into play– some may justify the sidelining of Black artists with the existence of more so-called “ appropriate categories.” In 2017, rapper Drake won Best Rap Song for “Hotline Bling,” in which he does not rap. In 2020, rapper Tyler, the Creator added to Drake’s sentiment upon receiving the Best Rap Album award for his album IGOR: “[It] sucks that whenever we—and I mean guys that look like me—do anything that’s genre-bending or anything, they always put it in the rap or urban category [...].” 

What even is ‘Urban’?

In the 1970s, New York radio DJ Frankie Crocker coined the term “Urban” as a loophole around advertising agencies’ “don’t buy Black” policy. The word, chosen to describe his audience, designated the various genres of Black music he broadcasted. In 1995, scholars used “contemporary urban music” as a synonym of hip-hop and rap. However, it holds little to no musical legitimacy; it simply keeps Black artists out of the Pop genre. In 2017, Beyoncé’s album Lemonade lost the Album of the Year award, but won Best Contemporary Urban Album. The most nominated woman and most awarded artist in Grammy history, out of all awards she’s won, Beyoncé has only ever won one major award. The Academy continues to disregard Beyoncé’s impact on popular music and restricts her to a "racially appropriate" category. 

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Doing better: the Grammys after Black Lives Matter

In 2020, the unlawful murder of George Floyd sparked a wave of introspection, reaching even the Recording Academy. Thus, they renamed the award for “Best Urban Contemporary Album” award to “Best Progressive R&B Album." It is still unclear what this terminology refers to musically. Yet, the “Latin Pop” category became “Latin Pop or Urban.” This proves that, despite some sort of awareness, the institution maintains the hierarchical structure of genres in the context of  world regions. If one defined popular and urban music from the United States separately, almost in opposition to one another, the same musical genres are essentialised in non-American contexts. Despite its best efforts, the Academy’s “commitment to evolve with the musical landscape” was not inclusive of every minority.

The Issue with World Music

Also in 2020, the ‘World Music’ category shifted to ‘Global Music’ to be mindful of the “connotations of colonialism [...] and ‘non-American.’” Singer Angélique Kidjo described ‘World Music' as “a politically correct way of calling our music 'Third World Music.'” Despite the name change, the nominees in this category remain natives of so-called “Third World” countries, or traditional music performers. Some, such as Nigerian singers Wizkid or Burna Boy, have found success in the West and collaborated with American Grammy-winning artists. We can better contextualise their nomination in the Global Music category once we address the colonial undertones the Academy attempts to erase.

The Curious Case of BTS 

If ‘Global Music’ truly encompassed “influential music from around the globe,” it would surely include K-Pop phenomenon BTS. In both 2020 and 2021, BTS was nominated for the Best Pop Duo/Group Performance award, yet lost in the former year. It is evident that the Grammys integrated BTS into the Pop category and exploited their massive following to improve its recently falling audience ratings and viewership. One can argue that the inclusion of BTS is at the junction between the othering of non-American and non-Western artists, and the necessity to include the genres and performers who can no longer be ignored in order to remain relevant in the global industry. The different treatments received by three rising “global” artists–Wizkid and Burna Boy on one side, and BTS on the other–prove the subjective and baseless nature of the categories chosen by the Academy.

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The Grammy Awards have only witnessed modern music history, they have not written modern music history. We cannot ignore the cultural and financial importance of Black artists  any longer. Black artists are not given the credit they deserve. Similarly, non-Western artists are increasingly welcomed, but not yet treated with proper equity. Institutions built on a racist and elitist system no longer control the music market: we do. It is our role as ever-connected consumers to dismiss outdated categories and support the artists we love– no matter their style, regardless of where they are from.

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