Grammy (Latin Music) and Latin Grammy Nominations Absurdity

Ok, we’ve come to accept that Grammy or Latin Grammy awards don’t always go to the deserving artist or album. Yet it’s inexplicable that the just-released Grammy 2020 nominations contradict the Latin Grammy 2019 ones!

This fact shows how arbitrary the Grammy nomination system is! Let me explain…

Grammy vs. Latin Grammy Album Nominations

The Latin Grammy is a more specialized award for Latin music. You would think the people that best know the music vote for nominees and winners.

The Grammy Awards, on the other hand, obviously have a broader scope. Latin music makes just a small piece of them. Because there are fewer categories in the Grammy Awards for Latin music, they have to merge Latin Grammy categories into one Grammy category.

Let me be specific. In the Grammy “Best Tropical Latin Album” category, you find nominees from the Latin Grammy categories of “Best Salsa Album”, “Best Traditional Tropical Album”, “Best Contemporary/Fusion Tropical Album” and “Best Folkloric Album“.

Now, here’s where it gets weird.

Marc Anthony’s “Opus” and Vicente Garcia’s “Candela” were not nominated for any Latin Grammy “Best Album” category. And yet, both are now nominated for “Best Tropical Latin Album” for the Grammy 2020. And yet, the winner of the Latin Grammy for “Best Salsa Album” (Tony Succar’s “Mas de Mi”), and the two best suited to have won that category (Eddie Palmieri’s “Mi Luz Mayor“ and Mario Ortiz Jr.’s “55 Aniversario“) neither of them were nominated for the Grammy.

Additionally, Aymee Nuviola, was nominated for the Grammy in the “Best Tropical Latin Album” category, but the winner of her Latin Grammy “Best Traditional Tropical Album” category (Andres Cepeda’s “Big Band En Vivo”, did not get the Grammy nomination!

Latin Pop Albums Better But Still Weird

So the Grammy “Best Latin Pop Album” category should include the Latin Grammy “Best Contemporary Pop Album”, “Best Traditional Vocal Pop Album”, and “Album of the Year” categories.

Four of the five nominees for the Grammy category were also nominees for the Latin Grammy in one or more of the above-mentioned categories. So far so good.

But Rosalia, the winner of two of the three Latin Grammy categories I mentioned, was not even nominated for the Grammy. Oh wait…she actually was nominated for a Grammy…in the “Best New Artist” category; a category she wasn’t nominated for in the Latin Grammy! What the…

And by the way, the winner of that 3rd category that Rosalia didn’t win (Fonseca’s “Agustin” for “Best Traditional Vocal Pop Album”), he wasn’t nominated either.

So the 5th nominee for the Grammy “Best Latin Pop Album” category is Maluma’s “11:11”, which wasn’t nominated for a Latin Grammy. And Maluma’s music is considered pop?

How About the Latin Jazz Category?

Not much better here. Of the Latin Grammy nominees for “Best Latin Jazz Album”, how many do you think were nominated for the Grammy in the same category? You guessed it! None!

Of the five nominees in this Grammy category, only two were released in time for consideration for the Latin Grammy, and of course, neither was nominated for the Latin Grammy.

Discrepancy in Latin Album Nominations Brings Discord

Some of the discrepancies are because the voters for each award are not exactly the same. There was a time when an inscribed voter could vote for both awards. The Academy changed that so that a voter has to inscribe (and pay) to subscribe (and therefore have the right to vote) in each music academy separately.

Perhaps this is part of the reason for this discrepancy!

If umpires in baseball had this kind of discrepancy in their strike zone, we wouldn’t have a game of baseball. There would be players, coaches, and managers ejected every inning! Nobody would put up with that crap. People would see the game for the stupidity it would become.

NARAS should care about these discrepancies among awards. The Grammy should for the most part congruent with the Latin Grammy, at least on the nominees’ part. We understand that the winner is either a toss-up or who has more influence over the voters, or who is the most popular artist.

But the nominees should have congruence with the specialized awards (Latin Grammy, Country Music Awards, etc.). Otherwise, we the music fans will get tired of the phoniness, and the whole thing will lose its meaning and value.