Taylor, Adele may not be eligible for the Songwriter of the Year Grammy

[TaylorSwift 161,818]

This year the Recording Academy has announced a batch of five new Grammy Award categories, including Songwriter Of The Year.

The Academy’s rules for the category specify that to be eligible, “songwriters must have written a minimum of 5 songs in which they are credited ‘solely’ as a songwriter or co-writer.” (In addition to that, they may submit four extra songs for consideration in which they have additional credits as performer.)

So that means that for Taylor Swift, for instance, to even be eligible for the songwriter of the year Grammy, she’d need to have received a writing credit on five songs during that eligibility period that she didn’t also perform on — like Little Big Town’s hit “Better Man”.

And while there are dozens of Taylor Swift covers released every year, they would not count towards her total unless they were officially released covers of songs she’d written that year.

It’s also worth noting that interpolations do not count towards these minimums.

That means that most star artists — who are rarely prolific enough to do that much outside songwriting for other artists in a given year — would not make the eligibility cutoff for this award.

The writer/producers will also have difficulty meeting the needed minimums.
Many of the biggest behind-the-scenes writers in pop music right now — think Jack Antonoff, Dan Nigro, Louis Bell, and of course Max Martin — are also renowned as producers, most often performing both functions on the same songs.
But to be eligible for songwriter of the year, they will also need to meet the five-song minimum of songs they wrote but did not receive producer (or performer) credits on.

source

[James Gibson 3,565]

i dont think most of these singer-songwriters were ever eligible if that category existed before

[Anderson123 42,517]

Such a complicated new category with very detailed explanation of what it needs for one to be included in it. I'm just curious to see how it's going to work out for songwriters during the next 5-10 years.

[PunkTheFunk 125,696]

God is good!

[voltron92 2,575]

13 minutes ago, Teletubby said:

This year the Recording Academy has announced a batch of five new Grammy Award categories, including Songwriter Of The Year.

The Academy’s rules for the category specify that to be eligible, “songwriters must have written a minimum of 5 songs in which they are credited ‘solely’ as a songwriter or co-writer.” (In addition to that, they may submit four extra songs for consideration in which they have additional credits as performer.)

So that means that for Taylor Swift, for instance, to even be eligible for the songwriter of the year Grammy, she’d need to have received a writing credit on five songs during that eligibility period that she didn’t also perform on — like Little Big Town’s hit “Better Man”.

And while there are dozens of Taylor Swift covers released every year, they would not count towards her total unless they were officially released covers of songs she’d written that year.

It’s also worth noting that interpolations do not count towards these minimums.

That means that most star artists — who are rarely prolific enough to do that much outside songwriting for other artists in a given year — would not make the eligibility cutoff for this award.

The writer/producers will also have difficulty meeting the needed minimums.
Many of the biggest behind-the-scenes writers in pop music right now — think Jack Antonoff, Dan Nigro, Louis Bell, and of course Max Martin — are also renowned as producers, most often performing both functions on the same songs.
But to be eligible for songwriter of the year, they will also need to meet the five-song minimum of songs they wrote but did not receive producer (or performer) credits on.

source

Sia can finally get that grammys from You-Know-Who's basement 

[DaftFameMonster 2,527]

Good, no vague requirement. It'll help honour songwriters in the music industry that may not get the recognition. 

[ssslyboy 3,273]

Yeah sounds complicated, but I think they're trying to give recognition to the pure songwriters who aren't also artists and producers.

[spector 1,919]

they really said, **** the hyphenated talents, no awards for the “singer-songwriters.” 🤡

[Bloody hooker 6,445]

This seems like a hot mess honestly, and may limit more people than you think. You can only be nominated for Songwriter of the Year if:

- 5+ song writing credits as solo or co-writer

- Didn’t get credit as a producer for any song

- The song isn’t an interpolation

I get the interpolation, but the producer credit is a weird one.

[gagawaffles 165]

Someone I can think of is Sia, who wrote songs for famous singers before she became one herself (though I know she had albums - she didn’t breakout til later in her career)

[Anderson123 42,517]

[Taylucifer 5,248]

wild, ok, sure

[BUtterfield 8 41,793]

So then who is eligible?

[Gagaism 12,466]

Imagine Taylor Swift being one of the most outstanding songwriters of this generation not being able to receive a songwriter award 

I mean, I do understand some of those requirements of course but some others  are really weird.

[GipJo 2,912]

23 minutes ago, Gagaism said:

Imagine Taylor Swift being one of the most outstanding songwriters of this generation not being able to receive a songwriter award 

I mean, I do understand some of those requirements of course but some others  are really weird.

Many other Grammys reward songwriters who are also perfromers already, I don't think it's weird to give more spotlight to people who only work behind the scenes.