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The Grammy Awards will increase the number of nominees in its top five-to-eight categories, a move that can help increase gender diversity after the awards have been heavily criticized this year for their lack of recognition for women's artists.
The change, announced Tuesday, will touch the four most prestigious categories: album, disc and song of the year, and best new artist. (Record of the year recognizes a single recording, while the song prize is for songwriters.) The new rule will come into effect immediately, with members voting on nominations this fall for the 61st annual exhibition next year.
"This change will better reflect the large number of entries in these categories and give voters greater flexibility in selecting the best recordings this year," said the Recording Academy, the organization behind the awards.
The revision comes after a difficult season for the Grammys, when the show and the direction of the academy were fired. At this year's ceremony, in January, the only woman named for the year album – Lorde – had no place in solo, and only one woman received a solo award in one of the few television categories (Alessia Cara, best new artist).
In addition, researchers from the University of Southern California published a report showing that women accounted for only 9.3 percent of Grammy nominees in the last five years in the top four categories, as well as the producer of the year. The study, published just before the Grammys, served as an ominous report for the music industry above all, but most of the criticisms that resulted were directed to the awards ceremony.
As a result of this year 's show, the Recording Academy has appointed a working group to examine diversity and other issues. And Neil Portnow, the president of the academy, announced that he would resign in 2019 after being severely reprimanded for a remark that women in music should "make progress" to advance their careers.
Tuesday's announcement included several other updates, including the second tweak in four years to the definition of alternative music.
The last change had defined the alternative as "recordings" that take as starting point any existing musical genre or combination of genres, and broaden and redefine the boundaries of these genres ".
The new definition is more expansive, calling alternative "less intense version of rock or a more intense version of pop", which "can embrace a variety of subgenres or any hybrid and may include recordings that do not fit into another kind of categories. "
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