Mainstream music's night-of-nights brings its honk and strum to the Web.
The "39th Annual Grammy
Awards," airing tonight on CBS at 8 p.m. PST, will sound off in
cyberspace with the help of Apple Computer and The National Academy of Recording
Arts and Sciences.
What does this mean exactly? The Grammy WebCast turned on its Grammy LiveCam at Madison
Square Garden as of the wee hours of this morning, eyeballing
behind-the-scenes Grammy pre-prep, rehearsals, and the like. Then at 1 p.m.
PST, the WebCast gears up for a hosted backstage look at the Grammy show,
featuring an awards posting and coverage of a VIP party.
As Grammy doesn't know the meaning of the word "contained," the week has
seen a veritable oil spill of pre-Grammy Web events with a Tracy Chapman chat, tribute to Phil Collins, and the Fugees live,
among a tanker-full of other slick offerings.
From the Gin Blossoms to Celine Dion to Babyface,
the Grammy WebCast center serves up a complete listing of nominees. If the
Webmasters had truly done their homework, you'd also find a dazzling array
of links. There isn't a one, so it's left to Music Previews Network and CBS to mop up. And
while the site isn't particularly awe-inspiring, it does proffer some Grammy
historical trivia and a forum for posing questions to the nominees.
Be prepared. The Grammy Webcast counsels users to have at the ready
Netscape Navigator 2.0 or better, 16 MB of memory or greater, QuickTime 2.5,
and 28.8 modems for live video feed. Collect your tools in advance of
the Webcast to avoid the rush.
Take note. If this live music-biz love-in fails to fill your eardrum,
there's always The Grammys CD-ROM and "Ninety Six
Grammy Nominees," the album.
-- Merrill Gillaspy
Image credit: © 1997 Apple Computer, Inc., The Recording Academy