The 66th annual Grammy Awards brought audiences many things: the announcement of a new Taylor Swift album, a viral performance of Tracy Chapman performing her hit “Fast Car” alongside country singer Luke Combs, a historic and beautiful appearance from legend Joni Mitchell and — perhaps most importantly — – women artists sweeping the major awards.
According to the LA Times, female artists dominated the nominations in major categories. For album, record and song of the year, women vocalists and musicians held nominations for seven of the eight spots and women took more than half of the slots in Best New Artist.
Taylor Swift made history with the most “Album of the Year” wins by any artist. In a study that analyzed the top 100 songs in 2020, less than 13 percent of songwriters of those songs were women. The study also said this statistic has stayed the same over the past decade (2010-2020). In 2020, just over 20 percent of artists on Billboard’s Top 100 charts were female, and this statistic was even lower in genres like hip-hop or alternative. Swift’s accomplishments, therefore, are more profound when one considers the lack of support the music industry has given towards female artists.
Neil Portnow — the chairman and CEO of The Recording Academy from 2002 to 2009 — recently came under fire for a quote he gave in response to a question about the lack of nominated women in the awards show in 2018.
“Women who have the creativity in their hearts and souls who want to be musicians [need] to step up,” Portnow said.
After alternative rock band Boygenius — composed of Lucy Dacus, Julien Baker and Phoebe Bridgers — won one of their three Grammys of the night, a reporter asked them what they thought about success for female artists.
“I have something to say about women,” Bridgers said. “The ex-president of the Recording Academy, Neil Portnow, said that if women want to be nominated in the Grammys, they should step up… and to him I’d like to say: I know you’re not dead yet, but when you are, I hope you rot in piss.”
The case for gender-neutral categories in awards shows is growing, with the Film Independent Spirit Awards, the MTV Movie & TV Awards and other film organizations switching to gender-neutral categories in their shows. Kim Elsesser, in an article for Forbes magazine, points out the outdated nature of gendered categories and questions why the Oscars sticks so firmly to their “Best Actor” and “Best Actress” style awards. This argument is complicated because while many say gendered categories are outdated, their removal has exposed stark gender disparities in Grammy winners for the past decade. The Grammys was trailblazing for merging their male and female categories in 2012, but because of this, between 2013 and 2021 less than 10 percent of nominees for awards like Record of the Year, Album of the Year and Producer of the Year were women.
Another highlight of the “year for women” was the allyship among women throughout the ceremony. Audiences at the ceremony and at home alike celebrated their favorite female artists, such as Victoria Monet, Billie Eilish, Miley Cyrus, Laufey and SZA, as they were recognized for their hard work and overcame the barriers the industry set for them.
In her speech for winning Album of the Year, Taylor Swift thanked Lana Del Rey, who she brought on stage with her to accept the award. Del Rey’s album “Did You Know There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Boulevard” had been nominated in the same category.
“So many female artists would not be where they are and would not have the inspiration they have if not for the work that she’s done,” Swift said. “I think she’s a legacy artist, a legend in her prime right now.”
Throughout the performances, the cameras panned to see women supporting each other, such as the audiences dancing to Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers” and Olivia Rodrigo’s “Vampire,” to name a few. Even when Jay Z got on the stage – one of the few men who won an award that night — he dedicated his time to talking about his wife Beyonce, who has famously been robbed of proper recognition by The Recording Academy. Some people speculated that Jay Z was criticizing Swift in the process — but he never made any direct statement towards her.
According to AP News, an average of 16.9 million people tuned in to the Grammys this year, showing that awards shows are an easy way to spread an important message to a huge population. Instead of promoting competition and old-fashioned gendered categories, artists came together to celebrate each other’s achievements.
Contact Eliana Joftus at joftus@oxy.edu
