May 26, 2011 – A group of Los Angeles Latin Jazz artists, actors, writers, and music lovers gathered today outside the Beverly Hilton Hotel to protest the NARAS (National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences) decision to eliminate the Latin Jazz category (along with 30 others) from the Grammy awards. NARAS’ board of trustees is holding meetings at the hotel this week. The demonstration is third in a series of planned protests by the Grammy Watch Group that began last week in New York and San Francisco. The group is asking NARAS to immediately reinstate the 31 categories.
According to the Associate Press (AP), Grammy President and CEO Neil Portnow said the cuts would stay in effect for the 2012 Grammy awards, but he urged dissenters to work with the academy so that the effects of the changes can be examined for the 2013 awards. Protesters, however, hope the process can be reversed in time for 2012 if at least one board member asks the academy to reconsider. “He’s being arrogant in saying that it’s written in stone when we have a chance to get these categories reinstated,” said Bobby Sanabria, a four-time Grammy nominee in the Latin Jazz category and one of the most vocal musicians against the changes, on an AP interview yesterday.
Intending to mobilize the community and pressure NARAS to reconsider, well known Los Angeles Latin Jazz artists like Pete Escovedo, Bobby Matos, and Oscar Hernandez made themselves available for today’s rally. “As Frank Sinatra so beautifully said at the first Grammy Awards in 1959, ‘Remember, it’s about excellence, not popularity’” said Bobby Matos, the spokesperson for the Los Angeles Grammy Watch Group, “The Grammy awards should celebrate America’s musical landscape and all of its diversity. The current administration, under Neil Portnow, has failed to administer this mission. We ask that all 31 categories cut be restored immediately.”
For more information about this effort visit http://www.grammywatch.org
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