The Recording Academy™ will honor its 2017 Special Merit Awards recipients with an awards ceremony and live tribute concert on Tuesday, July 11, 2017, at the Beacon Theatre in New York City. This year's Lifetime Achievement Award honorees are Shirley Caesar, Ahmad Jamal, Charley Pride, Jimmie Rodgers, Nina Simone, Sly Stone, and the Velvet Underground. Led by GRAMMY®-winning entertainer Paul Shaffer as musical director, the tribute concert will feature rare performances by honorees and never-before-seen renditions by those they've inspired. Confirmed to perform are Lifetime Achievement Award honoree John Cale of the Velvet Underground, Lifetime Achievement Award honoree Caesar, jazz pianist Stanley Cowell, past GRAMMY nominee Andra Day, 12-time GRAMMY winner Kirk Franklin, six-time GRAMMY winner Randy Newman, past GRAMMY nominee Catherine Russell, Lifetime Achievement Award honoree Pride, past GRAMMY nominee Valerie Simpson, five-time GRAMMY winner Dionne Warwick, past GRAMMY nominee Charlie Wilson, and two-time GRAMMY winner Dwight Yoakam. Tickets for the event are on sale now via Ticketmaster.
Additional Special Merit Awards honorees to be celebrated include Thom Bell, Mo Ostin, and Ralph S. Peer, who are this year's Trustees Award honorees, and Alan Dower Blumlein, who is the Technical GRAMMY Award recipient. Also being honored is Keith Hancock, this year's recipient of the Music Educator Award™.
Now in its second year, the "GRAMMY Salute To Music Legends™" event will be produced in partnership with THIRTEEN as part of the "Great Performances" series on PBS, set to air later this year. Previously held during GRAMMY Week, this is the second year the Recording Academy has celebrated the Special Merit Awards with a stand-alone TV event and musical tribute. In addition to the tribute concert, special celebrity guests will present recipients their award statues and guests will enjoy video packages produced specially for the event celebrating each of the honorees' contributions to the music industry and our cultural heritage.
A production of THIRTEEN Productions LLC for WNET, "GRAMMY Salute To Music Legends" will be written by David Wild and directed for television by David Horn, with Mitch Owgang as producer, and David Horn and Neil Portnow as executive producers.
The
Lifetime Achievement Award honors performers who have made contributions of outstanding artistic significance to the field of recording, while the Trustees Award recognizes such contributions in areas other than performance. Both awards are determined by a vote of the Recording Academy's National Board of Trustees. Technical GRAMMY Award recipients are determined by vote of the Academy's Producers & Engineers Wing® Advisory Council and Chapter Committees and ratified by the National Board of Trustees. The award is presented to individuals and companies who have made contributions of outstanding technical significance to the recording field. Visit
www.grammy.org/recording-academy/awards for complete lists of previous nominees.
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