Over the weekend, the CEO of the Recording Academy, Harvey Mason Jr., confirmed that the academy has begun the process of giving Afrobeats its own category at the Grammys.
While at the Global Citizens Festival in Ghana on Saturday, Mason Jr. said, “We just had a meeting literally about six or seven days ago with leaders of the Afrobeats community. We had a listening session, a virtual listening session where we heard from Afrobeats creators to talk about ‘what are the different subgenres, what are the needs, what are the desires,’ and my goal is to make sure we represent all genres of music including Afrobeats at the Grammys.”
He continued, “But it has to be done properly. I don’t decide the categories. The categories are decided by proposals submitted by members. So the members can say, ‘Harvey, I want an Afrobeats category,’ they write a proposal, it comes into the academy, it gets voted on then we’ll have it. That process has started now. I think the listening session last week was very important. It was very valuable and a step toward that path.”
This isn’t confirmation that Afrobeats will be getting its own category, but it is definitely a step in the right direction. For the past half-decade, the genre has been growing in popularity thanks in part to artists like Burna Boy, Wizkid, Davido, Tems, Fireboy DML, Tiwa Savage and a plethora of others taking the genre outside of Africa.
While Afrobeats is mainly a description of pop music from Ghana and Nigeria, I think it’s important that these African artists also get a category of their own to recognize the growth of the genre globally. While some people may try to downplay the award show’s importance, the Grammys continue to be a significant measuring stick of the value placed on artists. If you’re nominated once, for the rest of your career you are a “Grammy-nominated artist,” which immediately increases your clout for shows and other business dealings.
Rap, country, R&B, Latin, dance, Rock and alternative all have their own categories and sub-categories, why can’t Afrobeats? Anything to increase the visibility of Black artists should be considered, and if giving Afrobeats its own category at the Grammys does that, it sounds like fair game to me.