The Recording Academy, the organization behind the annual GRAMMY Awards, has announced agreements with Ministries of Cultures and key stakeholders across the Middle East and Africa to extend its efforts to support music creators on a global scale. The Recording Academy is working with the Ministries of Culture in Kenya, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and Nigeria, the Department of Culture and Tourism in Abu Dhabi for the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Rwanda Development Board (RDB), and the Ministry of Sports, Arts and Culture in South Africa. Additionally, MOUs have been signed with Ghana and the Ivory Coast.
Through the newly announced agreements, the Recording Academy will collaborate with its partners on a framework to bolster the Academy’s presence and services in these rapidly growing music regions while taking its mission international. Through these collaborations, and in alignment with our mission, the Academy will explore several key initiatives, including:
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For the past two years, Recording Academy leaders, including Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason Jr. and Recording Academy President Panos A. Panay, have traveled throughout these regions, participated in listening sessions, received high-level briefings, tours, and demonstrations, and obtained insight directly from both the governmental ministries and local music creators driving innovation in these markets.
“This is exciting because music is one of humanity’s greatest natural resources,” Mason Jr. said in a statement about the Recording Academy’s global expansion. “It is critical that the people who dedicate themselves to creating music have support, resources and opportunities, no matter where they are from.”
“The Recording Academy is dedicated to supporting music creators around the world,” Panay added in a statement. “Our expansion efforts into these fast-growing regions reflect our commitment to fostering a truly global music community, where creators at every stage of their careers and from every corner of the world have the resources and support they need to thrive.”
As the first phase of plans to support music creators abroad, this expansion into the Middle East and Africa comes the same year the Academy celebrates the 25th anniversary of the Latin GRAMMY Awards, taking place this November in Miami, and months after the Latin Recording Academy hosted the 2023 Latin GRAMMYs in Seville, Spain, marking the first-ever international GRAMMY Awards show. This year at the 2024 GRAMMYs, the Recording Academy also introduced the inaugural Best African Music Performance GRAMMY category, which recognizes recordings that utilize unique local expressions from across the African continent. Also, the Recording Academy last year partnered with the U.S. State Department on an initiative to promote peace through music.
Kenya’s Hon. Ababu Namwamba, EGH, Cabinet secretary for Youth Affairs, Sports and the Arts said, “Creative Economy is among the key cogs in the wheel driving the Bottom-up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA) in Kenya. The country has placed a premium on music, film, theatre, content creation, fashion, pageantry, and other creative industries as a pivot for job creation, revenue generation and economic growth for sustainable livelihoods. With a predominantly youthful population that is well educated, innovative and passionate in stretching the frontiers of imagination, Kenya considers the creative sector as a fitting ignition for lighting and unleashing the full potential of this enormous youth bulge.
South Africa’s Tshepo Mahloele, Chairman of Arena Holdings shared, “It is an exciting era for African and particularly South African music to finally work with the Recording Academy in ways that will provide the opportunity for African music to be recognized and celebrated on the global stage. We are proud to have advanced this exciting partnership.”
However, some critics of the initiative object to the move. Specifically, controversial Ghanaian media personality and musician Blakk Rasta. According to him, the awards are coming to capitalize on African music. He also thinks it’s a colonialist idea.
