While the Oscars generally stay the same every year, the Recording Academy does things a little differently for its Grammy Awards. To reflect the constantly evolving music atmosphere, the Board of Trustees made more changes to categories. The biggest one, though, is allowing samples to be credited in all song categories.
The Academy announced today that samples or interpolations of previously written and recorded material will be allowed in all categories. That means that if a song has a sample, it will be allowed to compete for the songwriters’ top award, the Song of the Year Grammy and others, no matter what genre.
Radio.com notes that the previous rules only allowed songs with samples in the rap song category.
Samples in rap songs have been common for years and now any future hits will not be excluded from the major awards. Had this rule been around when Jay Z’s “99 Problems” was eligible, it would be allowed to compete for Song of the Year, even though he sampled Ice-T’s track of the same name.
Here are some of the other category changes the Recording Academy announced:
The Best American Roots Performance will be introduced and presented to the artists involved in the recording.
The Dance/Electronica Field and the Best Dance/Electronica Album award will now be called Dance/Electronic Field and Best Dance/Electronic Album. Can you spot the difference?
Best Pop Instrumental Album is now known as Best Contemporary Instrumental Album.
Best Instrumental Arrangement and Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocals was renamed Best Arrangement, Instrumental Or A Cappella and Best Arrangement, Instruments And Vocals.
The entire Gospel/Contemporary Christian Music Field was restructured with new names given for the awards presented in those categories.
The Grammys are set for Feb. 8, 2015. A total of 83 awards will be presented before and during the live CBS broadcast.
image courtesy of INFphoto.com