Star Wars Escalate for Music Award Shows

You’d think that the producers of next month’s Grammy Awards telecast would be falling all over themselves trying to get Sean “Puffy” Combs to perform on the show.

The record company CEO-turned-performer, a.k.a. rapper Puff Daddy, racked up seven nominations and is arguably the most talked-about artist in all of pop music these days, thanks to such hits as “I’ll Be Missing You” and “Been Around the World.”

But Grammy officials are effectively banning Combs from performing on the Feb. 26 CBS telecast. His sin: agreeing to perform on tonight’s ABC-TV broadcast of the rival American Music Awards from the Shrine Auditorium.

The hip-hop star is the latest act to get caught in the cross-fire as television’s two most high-profile music awards shows battle behind the scenes to attract many of the same performers--and viewers.

“What’s fundamentally wrong with the competition is that it lessens the exposure for artists who have music and performances that consumers want to see and hear,” says artist manager Arnold Steifel, whose former client, five-time Grammy winner Toni Braxton, lost all chance of performing on the Grammys last year after performing on the rival show.

At stake for the networks and the shows themselves are ratings, which determine advertising rates, and bragging rights.

For the artists, a memorable performance on either show could result in millions of dollars in album sales. Performances on both, of course, would double their exposure to record buyers.

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The 40th annual Grammy Awards and 25th annual American Music Awards special will be followed this year by several other music awards shows--two network country shows, the MTV Video Music awards, the Billboard awards and the Soul Train Music awards among them.

But the Grammys and the AMAs, whose average rating for the last 24 years is almost identical, generate the most competition because of their proximity on the calendar.

The issue of artist exclusivity came to a head six years ago when Grammy officials, fearful that the impact of their show had been lessened, decided not to allow acts to sing the same song from one show to the next.

But the officials toughened their stance--extending the ban to the performers themselves--after Whitney Houston not only performed at the American Music Awards ceremony in 1994 but also made eight trips to the winner’s podium.

When Houston then performed the opening number at the Grammys a few weeks later, the ratings dipped during the first quarter-hour of the broadcast.

“That really slapped us in the face,” says Michael Greene, CEO of the National Assn. of Recording Arts & Sciences, which presents the Grammys. “We’d never had the ratings go down at the beginning of the show.”

Last year, after effectively being forced to choose between the two telecasts, LeAnn Rimes joined Braxton in opting for the American Music Awards, while Celine Dion and No Doubt went with the Grammy telecast.

Producers of the American Music Awards, however, say that any rivalry between the shows is one-sided and mostly “silliness.”

“People watch awards shows for lots of reasons--not just because of who’s performing on the shows,” says Larry Klein, co-producer of the AMA telecast. “The average viewer looks in to see who’s there, what their hair looks like, what they’re dressed in or who they’re married to or dating.”

Adds co-producer Al Schwartz: “Our shows are a month apart. Nobody is going to say, ‘Oh, I saw that band a month ago. I’m not going to watch them again.’ ”

Schwartz, in fact, believes that the AMA telecast builds interest in the Grammys, giving fans a rooting interest in the artists who will be competing for awards on the February show.

“Of course, I’m not sitting from the point of view of Michael Greene, who’s probably saying, ‘I wish the other show would go away,’ ” Schwartz adds. “I think all of these shows are good for the music business.”

Executive produced by Dick Clark, the American Music Awards were created as a Grammy competitor after ABC, unwilling to televise the Grammys from Nashville, opted out of its contract with the recording academy when the academy staged its 1973 awards show in the country music capital.

CBS picked up the Grammy contract in ’73 and, a year later, the American Music Awards debuted on ABC. The AMA telecast has drawn a higher rating 14 times in 24 years, and its average rating during that time is slightly higher than the Grammys’. Last year, the average viewership for the AMA special was 19.7 million. For the Grammys, it was 19.2 million.

The Grammy Awards, voted upon by the 9,000 members of the recording academy, are far more prestigious than the American Music Awards, which are determined by a poll of record buyers after a ballot is put together based on sales and radio airplay information.

The viewership for the American Music Awards is younger, but both shows sell records.

Geoff Mayfield, charts editor for Billboard magazine, says the list of artists who have benefited from performing on the shows is endless--including Alanis Morissette, Bonnie Raitt, Toni Braxton and Joan Osborne in recent years.

“Even more important than winning sometimes is getting a chance to play,” Mayfield says. “In a lot of cases, it’s the first time consumers have a chance to connect the songs with the artists.”

What will record labels do to get their acts on the shows?

“Cajole and beg and plead,” says Bob Merlis, senior vice president of worldwide corporate communications at Warner Bros. Records. “It’s monumental exposure.”

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Combs’ manager, Benny Medina, says his client didn’t want to choose between the two shows.

“We want to do the American Music Awards, the Grammy Awards, the Soul Train Awards, the Academy Awards,” Medina says. “We hope tomorrow the Grammy people call and say, ‘Please be a part of our show.’ ”

It won’t happen, and Mayfield says that’s a shame.

“I guess that’s their prerogative, but it’s kind of ugly,” he says. “There should be room for artists to appear on both shows--especially if they have more than one hit. And as far as record retailers are concerned, the more [appearances] the merrier.”

But Greene is adamant.

“Somewhere along the way, we had to make a stand,” he says. “And we did it pursuant to what the numbers and the statistics and the audience research told us. . . .

“We can’t air a copycat show. It’s bad television.”

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Battle of Award Shows

With many music award programs on the calendar, artist exclusivity can be hard to come by. Here’s a rundown of coming award programs:

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PROGRAM NETWORK DATE American Music Awards ABC Tonight Grammy Awards CBS Feb. 25 Soul Train Music Awards Syndicated Feb. 27 Blockbuster Entertainment Awards UPN March 10 Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards Nickelodeon April Academy of Country Music Awards CBS April 22 Dove Awards (gospel) TNN April 23 NAACP Image Awards Fox Spring TNN Music City News Country Awards TNN June 15 MTV Video Music Awards MTV September CMA Awards (country) CBS Sept. 23 Billboard Music Awards Fox December

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