Posted: 2/26/03

Awards programs are a dime a dozen today

Pardon me, but I couldnít watch Sunday nightís Grammy Awards program. Just couldnít do it.

I love my music but more and more in recent years, Iíve turned away from all the award shows that are a dime a dozen and forced down our throats.

It is not just music awards. It is the same for the movie industry, television, and even the Broadway stage.

Maybe Iím a dinosaur when it comes to music. The Grammy Awards really donít mean that much to me. It is billed as the big show, but if it is, why are there so many other award shows?

In looking over the artists nominated this year, I couldnít relate to many. Sure, there were some of the old standbys. Guys like Elton John, Bruce Springsteen and James Taylor are in some respects throwbacks to another time in music. I understand Simon and Garfunkel made an appearance.

But artists like Avril Lavigne, Norah Jones, John Mayer, Ashanti and Vanessa Carlton? Canít say I could tell you one of their songs.

There are so many awards programs today that I really canít keep them straight. Along with the Grammyís, there are awards for rhythm and blues, country, pop, jazz, rap, hip-hop and you name it.

My radio is tuned to classic rock and easy listening stations so there is a reason why todayís popular music is so foreign today.

It would be so much simpler and cleaner if all the awards programs could be boiled down to one big show. Thatís what the Grammyís and the Academy Awards once were.

When you understand that the many different awards programs become television extravaganzas, it becomes clear. Itís all part of promotion and that is good and bad depending on your taste.

Todayís television viewing public doesnít leave much in the way of taste as a requirement. When something like 40 million viewers tuned in for the finale of ìJoe Millionaire,î Iím convinced the public will choke down almost anything that is packaged as entertainment and like it. And as long as the public likes it, the diet isnít about to change anytime soon.

Maybe this is a reflection of our society as a whole and the desire to dish out awards for a wide range of accomplishments. Weíve certainly seen it at the sports level.

In youth sports, it doesnít take much for a kid to come home with a trophy, a nice trophy at that, for simply participating in a tournament and not winning a championship.

At the high school level in Minnesota, we have so many classes for schools that the most die-hard sports fan has trouble keeping them straight. This class system is designed on the premises of giving kids an opportunity to compete at a state tournament.

Thatís all well and good but many have the suspicion that there is a hidden motive that boils down to the goal of just making kids, and the coaches, feel good.

Those of us in the newspaper business have gone down the awards road, too. For those of us working in the business, there are award competitions offered by the MNA, the NNE, the MFPA and a couple of other minor awards programs.

Why, those of us working at ECM newspapers compete for ECM company awards. We feel good when we win.

It would mean more, of course, if the winner of any award would be the winner in only one competition. Then it would truly mean something.

Thatís why there is little interest here in learning the winners of Grammy Awards for record of the year or song of the year.

With so many awards programs, itís hard to get excited about artists you donít know and music youíve never heard.

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