The outspoken singer India Arie, who is not afraid to speak her mind, let loose after the Grammys for 2014. Speaking along with a chorus of many other black performers who are determining that the Grammys are virtually worthless, Arie gave her honest opinions about this and other musical awards shows, which are focused mainly on awarding popularity and sales, but only concerned with musical quality as a complete afterthought.

Writing on her tumblr page, Arie started off by stating that the “Music industry’s biggest night” is not what it’s cracked up to be:

Though it’s called “Music industries biggest night” the #Grammys are NOT about the music, it’s a popularity contest. The voting process allows people, to vote on name recognition alone – the music industry politics is a whole NUTHER conversation. Too much to go into here.

The American Music Awards is a show that awards sales and popularity – the #Grammys are SAID to be about the music.

NOW the BIGGER losers, are ALL of black music. Where was the black music community represented in last nights #Grammy show? Performers and Winners (or not) … Where were the black artists?

And this isn’t the first time the #Grammy’s has had a show all but excluding young black America and black artists in general, although we set the worlds musical trends. Why NOT televise the lifetime achievement awards of the Isley Brothers? SURELY they deserved to be on televised stage LAST NIGHT! While other artists were on stage TWICE?

You can read more of her letter here.

http://naturallymoi.com/2014/01/celebrities/india-arie-writes-angry-open-letter-about-the-grammys-black-artists-are-excluded/

Commentary: For the Grammys,Diversity Ends When the Music Starts

by Chris Rizik (Soultracks)

(January 27, 2014) On a night when the Grammy Awards pulled out all the stops to show the world that it celebrates “Same Love,” its broadcast more subtly showed the world that it really celebrates “Same Music.” Grammy leaders’ hands were tired from so much self-congratulation on their embrace of human diversity (33 straight and same sex couples took their wedding vows during the show following the Macklemore and Ryan Lewis performance of “Same Love”), but those same leaders produced perhaps the least musically diverse Grammy Awards in history. It was a great night if you were a country, pop, rock or hip-hop fan (or a fan of Pink's aerial acrobatics). But if your love was Jazz, Gospel, Latin, Soul or R&B, then, well…not so much.

In 1989, the Grammys had a 10 minute Gospel celebration featuring the first family of Gospel, the Winans. That seemed like a million years ago last night, when the closest thing to Gospel was the contrived appearance of a choir at the end of the rap performance on "Same Love.” How about classical music? If we’re being generous, classical received a full minute of acknowledgement during the nearly four hour show, when Chinese pianist Lang Lang played a mini tribute to the late Van Cliburn. Latin music? Well, they let Marc Anthony present a rock award, if that counts. And Jazz? You’re kidding, right?

All told, the “Big Four” selling genres, hip-hop, rock, pop and country, accounted for seventeen full performances during the show. All the other categories together accounted for one. John Legend broke the Grammys’ no hitter with a short version of his song "All of Me." The only other solace for Soul/R&B fans was seeing Nile Rodgers and Stevie Wonder accompany French popsters Daft Punk on“Lucky,” the evening’s best performance. Ironically, the transcendence of that moment seemed to highlight even more how seminal genres like Blues, Jazz and Soul were otherwise ignored on this night of music celebration.

The Grammys’ stated mission is to “honor excellence in the recording arts and science” by granting awards “to artists and technical professionals for artistic or technical achievement, not sales or chart.” But it was tough to avoid thinking about the charts as the show shunned all but the most mainstream of styles. It was part of a dramatic, conscious shift begun in 2012 to present a new type of Grammy show. Gone was the Grammys as a travelogue through the musical world. In its place arose the Soundscan Grammys, a narrowcast show focused on only biggest stars and the biggest genres, aimed directly at a pretty un-diverse audience: teens and suburbanites. So rock, pop, hip-hop and country moved up, and everything else moved out. If you wanted to see any Jazz, Blues or Classical performances, you had to fire up your computer and watch hours earlier on the web, during a time that we unsophisticated folks in Michigan call “the workday.”

Unfortunately, I’m guessing that the Grammy organizers are feeling pretty good about themselves. For the third straight year, TV ratings for the show were up, even as the Grammys largely gave the middle finger to urban audiences, especially older urban audiences (who openly vented their anger on social media). If the goal of the Grammys has changed, and its purpose now is simply to compete with the ABC and Fox Sunday night lineups for market share, then it succeeded. But if Grammys really intend to give more than lip service to its stated focus on the diversity and breadth of music in this time of unprecedented musical variety, then it was an utter failure. Once the show started, winning artists ranging from Jazz’s Gregory Porter to Soul music’s Lalah Hathaway to Latin star Draco Rosa to Gospel’s dynamic Tye Tribbett were relegated to the cheap seats. And on a night that is designed to spotlight the best modern music has to offer, it became clear that the only way these brilliant, diverse artists were going to get any camera time was if they got to spin Pink's acrobatic wire.

By Chris Rizik

No Shit! Glad she spoke up. I read The Isley Bros and Mexican composer Armando Manzanero got a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Awards, but no tribute.

These awards shows are shot...

they lost all credibility when the Recording Academy gave MIlliv Vanilli 2 Grammys back in 1990

I loved when Natalie Cole had her night to shine for Unforgettable

Lauren Hill and Carlos Santana and Bonnie Rait

I always thought Jay-Z should have won best rap album for "The Blueprint"...that's one of the greatest albums I've ever heard for any genre......

January 27, 2014

The 2014 Grammy’s: Open...@IndiaArie

pReACh iNdIa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WHEN BLACK ARTIST PRODUCE QUALITY WORK,THEY WILL GET THEIR PROPS.

I was with her till she said we need the BET awards. We don't... we really don't

I don't know. Is it really ALL about popularity? I had never heard of Draft Punk or Macklemore and Ryan Lewis until yesterday.

jackson35 said:

WHEN BLACK ARTIST PRODUCE QUALITY WORK,THEY WILL GET THEIR PROPS.

Pretty scary when Rhianna is not only winning Grammy Awards, but winning them for an ENTIRE album??? Yikes!!!

Angry? Why? It's the shitty grammys. Bought and paid for. Real artists shouldn't really care either way.

In reading that letter and who she gave props to and the manner in which she gave them, seems like she's solely and exclusively on the side of black artists only. So fuck her, she's a racist shit stirrer.

[Edited 1/28/14 17:00pm]

The Grammys??? What's that? Oh yeah, that crappy awards show I stopped watching nearly five years ago.

The last thing she or any so-called decent musician need to be worried about is the Grammys. Fuck out of here with that shit. The awards are so political, come on India, figure it out! Over 30 and you don't know it's political?

How much power does Jimmy Jam have to set the agenda for the show..He is the Chirman of NARAS

Marrk said:

Angry? Why? It's the shitty grammys. Bought and paid for. Real artists shouldn't really care either way.

In reading that letter and who she gave props to and the manner in which she gave them, seems like she's solely and exclusively on the side of black artists only. So fuck her, she's a racist shit stirrer.

[Edited 1/28/14 17:00pm]

I don't about racist, but afrocentric, yes. Sounds like that bothers you...

jackson35 said:

WHEN BLACK ARTIST PRODUCE QUALITY WORK,THEY WILL GET THEIR PROPS.

You sound really ignorant with that statement.

Marrk said:

Angry? Why? It's the shitty grammys. Bought and paid for. Real artists shouldn't really care either way.

In reading that letter and who she gave props to and the manner in which she gave them, seems like she's solely and exclusively on the side of black artists only. So fuck her, she's a racist shit stirrer.

[Edited 1/28/14 17:00pm]

You really don't know what racism is, do you? I think you have racism mixed up with political incorrectness.

Gunsnhalen said:

I was with her till she said we need the BET awards. We don't... we really don't

hahahahahha that is so right :

Let's face it, American entertainment is boring as shit, because they are shaking in their boots, concerned with pleasing the stock holders and making a buck. When they know it will be free in some form over the Internet.

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This goes for music and movies. I find more entertainment on Youtube than any network now, and for some reason that pisses me off. I grew up with major networks and they are the worse offenders of programmed entertainment...except Scandal of course.

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I DVR'd the grammy's and watched in less than a hour. It was packed with so many commercials it wasn't funny. You're right Timmy, it's all politics and making money. It has nothing to do with art. Even the chairman of the Academy has to bow down to the network gods just to get the show on the air...and they have the control...not the academy.

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kitbradley said:

I don't know. Is it really ALL about popularity? I had never heard of Draft Punk or Macklemore and Ryan Lewis until yesterday.

No, not entirely. They defintely try to include something of merit. But a lot of it is about popularity, naturally. It's a TV show trying to get ratings.

The way I see the grammys is that I don't expect anything, so sometimes I am pleasantly surprised. But that doesn't have much to do with the actual topic of this thread

Dauphin said:

The only time people of color win a Grammy (or perform) is when they sell to white audiences, or sell out to white politics.

THIS.

Thanks India for daring to speak your mind!

errant said:

The Grammys are worthless when black people ARE there too.

^That..

Timmy84 said:

The last thing she or any so-called decent musician need to be worried about is the Grammys. Fuck out of here with that shit. The awards are so political, come on India, figure it out! Over 30 and you don't know it's political?

WORD.

im kind of confused. i dvdr'd the show just to see the performances i wanted to, but was i mistaken or did i not see black artists accepting awards, AND black artists performing? now if shes just mad because artists of no substance are the ones on the show thats the same for black or white.

This forum is becoming very heated regarding race as of late.

Timmy84 said:

The last thing she or any so-called decent musician need to be worried about is the Grammys. Fuck out of here with that shit. The awards are so political, come on India, figure it out! Over 30 and you don't know it's political?

Thank you. If she's so in touch with the messages she puts in her music, you would think the last thing she would care about is the Grammy's.

[Edited 1/29/14 7:27am]

the music industry will have to crash under is own demise before we can even think about turning it around

jackson35 said:

WHEN BLACK ARTIST PRODUCE QUALITY WORK,THEY WILL GET THEIR PROPS.

What planet are you on. I could list about 20 RnB artist that put out go stuff but black radio will not play anything that is real RnB and thus the music does not get heard and the artist do not get nominated and allowed to perform.

We have our own shows for a reason. At the least they could have let Charlie Wilson perform or given the Isley's their award on the televised show.