Do the Grammys Really Need to Drag Out Nomination Announcements?
Typically, there’s a system when it comes to revealing award show nominees.
The Golden Globes and Academy Awards ask a couple of celebrities to get up super early (because of course Hollywood is on the West Coast) to announce the nods for the shows’ biggest categories on a live stream. Then, whichever network is broadcasting the show will make some sort of announcement during their morning show.
The Grammys are a different beast entirely.
Early Dec. 5, four of the 57th annual Grammy Awards categories’ nominees were revealed by Pharrell Williams and Ed Sheeran on CBS This Morning before a bunch more were announced on Twitter via famous musicians’ accounts. A formal compilation of 82 of the 83 categories’ nods was released at 2 p.m. but the final (and perhaps most important) set of nominees wouldn’t be unveiled until 9 p.m. during “A Very GRAMMY Christmas.’’
When all is said and done, the Grammy nomination announcements will have spanned more than 12 hours. Is it worth it?
Last year, Billboard wrote “the nominations special generated 24.8 million comments in social media,’’ but only 5.4 million folks actually tuned in to watch the nominations concert, which up until this year was dubbed “The Grammy Nominations Concert Live!!’’ (Yes, with two exclamation points.)
In comparison, last week’s episode of The Amazing Race on CBS in the 8 p.m. Friday time slot drew the same number of viewers and the 2014 Grammys show itself was watched by more than by more than five times as many people (28.5 million viewers).
Friday’s concert is the first to be dubbed a “Christmas’’ special and is set to feature performances by nominees Sam Smith and Ariana Grande, Grammy Award winners Maroon 5, Mary J. Blige, and Pharrell Williams.
This year’s concert will feature holiday song performances as well as current pop hits in what could be an attempt by CBS to garner some Christmas-minded viewers — but will it make a dent in the number of viewers?
Does having nominees perform their songs now ahead of the Feb. 8 awards — where they’ll most likely perform them again — take away from the Grammys itself? Do we really need to drag out the nominations announcements over an entire Friday?
You be the judge. Sound off in the comments.
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