SIMON AND STREISAND YEARN FOR BIG WIN

Pop veterans Paul Simon and Barbra Streisand’s separate quests for the best-album honors provided the drama at the record industry’s 29th annual Grammy Awards ceremony Tuesday at the Shrine Auditorium.

Simon, who has won 10 previous Grammys, was trying to join Frank Sinatra and Stevie Wonder as the only artists ever to win three best-album awards.

The New York-based singer-songwriter was honored in 1970 for “Bridge Over Troubled Water” (with Art Garfunkel) and in 1975 for “Still Crazy After All These Years.”

Simon’s bid Tuesday was tied to “Graceland,” the acclaimed but controversial LP that was recorded partly with black musicians in South Africa--a move that led to charges that Simon had violated a cultural boycott in doing so.

Streisand, whose “The Broadway Album” was generally considered to be Simon’s main competition in the best-album balloting, won in the same category in 1963 for her LP “The Barbra Streisand Album.”

Also nominated this year in the best-album category: Peter Gabriel’s “So,” Janet Jackson’s “Control” and Steve Winwood’s “Back to the High Life.”

Simon, looking buoyant as he stepped on stage, got the telecast off to a festive beginning, singing “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes,” one of the most inviting numbers from the “Graceland” LP. He was joined in the number by several of the musicians who worked with him on the album, including the colorful, 10-member South Africa a cappela gospel-oriented group, Ladysmith Black Mambazo.

The audience reacted enthusiastically and emcee Billy Crystal even got in a quick quip. Referring to Simon’s old partnership, he said, “Is it just me or did Art Garfunkel look different?”

But Simon didn’t have the early moments of the telecast to himself. Streisand and Winwood also appeared on stage to pick up Grammys for best female pop vocal and male pop vocal, respectively. It was Streisand’s eighth Grammy and Winwood’s first.

In accepting the award, Streisand described her album, a collection of Broadway tunes, as a “reaffirmation” of the timelessness of the material.

Then, she confessed good-naturedly, that she felt she might win something Tuesday because it was Feb. 24--and 24 is her lucky number. She said she was born on the 24th, gave birth to her son on the 24th, and it was 24 years ago that she took home her first Grammy.

“With a little bit of luck and your continued support, I’d like to see you 24 years from now,” she added.

Winwood was also on hand to accept his award, which was presented by the female rock group the Bangles and Bob Geldof, the catalyst behind the Live Aid concerts of 1985. Winwood pulled a piece of paper from his back pocket and read a brief list of thank you’s. Among those saluted was his wife.

In the evening’s key competition, Dionne & Friends’ “That’s What Friends Are For” was bidding to become the second straight charity-related disc to win top single record honors. Last year’s winner in the category was the “We Are the World” supersession, which raised more than $53 million for famine victims in Africa. “Friends” has raised more than $750,000 for AIDS research.

Its rivals in the best-single balloting: Gabriel’s “Sledgehammer,” Whitney Houston’s “Greatest Love of All,” Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love” and Winwood’s “Higher Love.”

The awards are determined by a vote of the more than 6,000 members of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences.

It was cold and rainy much of the afternoon outside the Shrine so there were fewer than the usual number of fans on hand, hoping to catch a glimpse of their favorite pop stars. In fact, there only about 75 die-hards braved the lightning and thunder as limos began arriving around 2 p.m.

Unlike the Oscars ceremony at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, however, most of the stars arrive at the Shrine early in the day at a backstage area blocked from the public. So, the fans generally only get to see the arrival of less identifiable faces in the record business--executives, producers, songwriters, arrangers, session musicians. But the patient, if watersoaked fans did get a glimpse of a few of their favorites, including

Run-D.M.C., the New York-based rap trio, and the Judds, the country music mother and daughter team.

The activity inside the Shrine began around 3 p.m. with the presentation of Grammys to winners in 54 of the 68 categories. To save time during the three-hour CBS broadcast, only winners in 14 categories actually received their awards on camera. Winners in the other categories simply had their names read. While there was ample time to present all the awards during the show, the extra time was used to present music--giving the affair more viewer appeal.

This year’s lineup was scheduled to showcase a variety of musical styles, starting with the South African rhythms of Simon’s “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes.” Other performances scheduled included a blues tribute involving some of the field’s most respected names: B.B. King, Albert King and Willie Dixon, Etta James, Dr. John, Big Jay McNeely and Robert Cray. Guitarist-composer Ry Cooder was musical director.

Also scheduled to perform were Anita Baker, Simply Red, Billy Idol, Whitney Houston, Luther Vandross, Sandi Patti, Herbie Hancock and Bobby McFerrin. Country newcomers Steve Earle, Dwight Yoakum and Randy Travis also planned to team up for a number.

The Grammys have long been criticized as honoring mainstream commercial acts rather than challenging forces. Among the artists who were woefully underacknowledged during their peak creative years: Elvis Presley, the Beatles, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Bruce Springsteen, the Rolling Stones, the Who, David Bowie.

But the academy, which sponsors the Grammys, has acknowledged shortcomings in this area and academy president Michael Greene has intensified recent years to recruit new and younger voting members into the organization.

“All you’ve got to do is pull out a nomination list from five years ago and pull out this one (1987) and see that the cross-section of membership is very reflective of the broader spectrum of members.”

This year, the nomination of Simon and Gabriel meant that the year’s two most acclaimed studio albums were acknowledged by Grammy voters. One fear among many pop critics, though, was that the two albums would split the vote and allow Streisand’s collection of Broadway tunes, which was not well received by most critics, to walk away with the award.

The controversy surrounding the “Graceland” album has extended beyond the issue of whether Simon broke the cultural boycott. A small, but vocal corps of detractors have also accused Simon of exploiting the black musicians in South Africa and criticized him for not writing any explicit anti-apartheid songs in the album.

Simon, meanwhile, has pointed out he paid the musicians triple scale (the same ratio-to-scale that he paid his in-demand New York session players) and that he shared album royalties with some of them.

Simon, who brought several of the musicians from the album on a world tour, said he shares the anti-apartheid views of those who are criticizing him, but refuses to turn himself or his art or to any socio-political crusade. He branded most political pop as “pretentious.”

Among Simon’s defenders are singer Miriam Makeba and jazz trumpeter Hugh Masekela, South African exiles who are on the tour with him. They both say that Simon has done all South African musicians an invaluable servive through the album and tour by opening the world’s ears to South African music.

The Graceland tour, which begins a five-day run at the Universal Amphitheatre in Los Angeles on Tuesday, was highlighted by shows Feb. 14 and 15 in Harare, Zimbabwe that drew an estimated 34,000 fans. It was the largest integrated gathering in the country, which neighbors South Africa, since Zimbabwe’s Independence Day ceremony in 1980.

It helped in this year’s Grammy competition to be experienced. Or, put less diplomatically, old. Except for Janet Jackson, who is in her 20s, everyone in the best album category is over 35.

Winwood, 38, scored his first hits with the Spencer Davis Group in the mid-1960s with such tunes as “Gimme Some Loving,” and then gained added fame as members of the British rock bands Traffic and Blind Faith before beginning a solo career.

Another British rock veteran, Gabriel, was co-founder of the group Genesis before launching a solo career in the mid-’70s. Gabriel, 36, is one of rock’s most respected figures, someone who combines an arty presence, a feel for international musical strains and increasing socio-political sensitivity.

His composition, “Biko,” largely inspired Steve Van Zandt to study about apartheid situation in South Africa--a campaign that resulted in the recording of “Sun City,” an all-star project in 1985 that was nominated in two categories for a Grammy this year.

Simon, 45, and Streisand, 44, both registered their first Top 10 singles in the mid-60s.