Robert Baird

It is a given these days that the Grammy Awards telecast has devolved into a not very interesting TV variety show. And that most of the really interesting awards are given out off-camera the day before. Entertainers rather than musicians have become the focus of the entire affair. And while the annual grumbling about who did and did not deserve their award is nothing new; trends over the past several years are growing downright embarrassing. Bruno Mars over Kendrick Lamar? And Leonard Cohen winning Best Rock Performance?

In the They-Got-It-Right category, War on Drugs deserved the Best Rock Album award. The same thing applies to The Weeknd winning Best Urban Contemporary Album. The great New York City jazz label Mack Avenue Records deserved to win three Grammy Awards for records by Cecile McLorin Salvant, Billy Childs, and Christian McBride. And it was great to see Jason Isbell and The 400 Unit winning Best American Roots Song and Best Americana Album.

In the audiophile world, old friend and audio engineer par excellence Jim Anderson won Best Surround Sound Album for Jane Ira Bloom's Early Americans album. Another dear friend, Ms Amanda Sweet of Bucklesweet Media had a hand in helping Pablo Zeigler win the Grammy for Best Latin Jazz Album. And it was good to see the win in the Best Engineered Album: Classical by the Reference Recordings release of Shostakovich's Symphony No.5 and Barber's Adagio with Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra.