A couple of nights ago I caught on to the 50th anniversary of the Grammy Awards, and amidst jeers on Kanye West who is, as usual, perpetually pompous (sneered at the organizers for playing the music on him while he was still making his speech), it was meant to be a respectable event. The Grammy Awards made an effort to recognize just about everyone worth mentioning from over the 50 years it has been going on. But the formalities got a little off-set when you have the guy from Arrested Development hosting and making awkward jokes at the same time, and…wait, did I mention Kanye West?

And there’s the fact that Amy Winehouse, already snagging 5 Grammys and rightfully doing so, didn’t even get the Album of the year. The strange controversy all about her losing, has much to do with her losing to Herbie Hancock for an album I have yet to check because curiously enough, I’ve never heard of it prelude to all the acclaim. You know I ought to don that Indie snob hat I usually wear for this kind of occasion but I can’t. Is he that obscure these days? Did the pop jazz guy topple the breakthrough anorexic weirdo from London? And speaking of the latter, I feel bad that the oh-so-powerful Grammys couldn’t get her in the US because the embassy refused entry for Winehouse on crack. She looked so anxious on that last award, because album of the year would be such a slap to everyone’s face, but no: Herbie Hancock won, which just threw ice cold water on everyone. Never mind that Kanye West, doing his speech for Song of the year, singled out himself and Amy Winehouse as the only “deserving” winners for Album of the year and that he would not be surprised if it happened. The point is, Kanye, Herbie Hancock won, and some people are too SURPRISED to even bother asking the question why.

The Grammys have made some surprising upset over the years. In 2001, the 1970’s rock band Steely Dan won over then sweeping rap artist Eminem, and pundits nod their heads in agreement because, we’re talking about Steely Dan here. But some argue that Grammy award winners are supposed to represent the anthems of that particular year, which means that, the only way anyone gets a Grammy status is if he or she does have that critical mastery down pat, which meant sometimes, commercial success. Hancock made waves in the adult contemporary radio streams ONLY but produced, what was decidedly a musically and politically justified album, “River: Letters to Joni” was a tribute. People wonder why the choice this year was made on an artist the listening public’s barely heard of. We have to admit though that the listening public has transformed dramatically over the years. So is the Grammy trying to go back to the criterions upheld in the late 60’s up? Like it was some lost golden era music? What is it that the Grammy is trying to preserve?

It must be musical dignity. What the major upsets taught us really, is that both Eminem and Winehouse were white people who basked in success by hybridizing if not, capitalizing on music created by black people. The inter-racial concern is particularly too political to openly discuss without stirring an ample amount of confusion and outrage. But the point is, how many people can pull of writing and performing music white people have created without garbing on the gangsta’ high society tripe that has riddled the images of artists today? Hancock is a slap on West’s face but at the same time a snide remark on the hoards of artists who have lost their musical integrity in the midst of their gimmicks.

Towards the end of the event, some guy made this speech about how the next 50 years will be, inevitably governed by this transformed body of musical taste, and that the artists which will emerge then will be playing the music of their time. Possibly, the next wave artists to come will be tasteless and if anything, just a bunch of copycats. But I’d like to think that we’re not all that tasteless, and sometimes I’d like to think that some are improvisers instead of copycats. So the music snobs behind letting Hancock win over Winehouse might be fearing the day that the kids have to learn to appreciate music beyond the music ascribed to their time and that there are essentially more elements to it that go beyond the mainstream. This move can teach us a lot about being open-minded but I still feel that Winehouse could have and should have won. She could have won if the political comment was unnecessary for this time — but it was. To me, she should have won because of the musical merit that is thought to be possessed by the Grammy’s Album of the year: musical charisma.