The Grammys Don’t Get that African Music is More than Afrobeats

Seven of the eight artists nominated for Best African Music Performance at next year’s Grammys are Nigerian artists. The only non-Nigerian on the list is American singer Chris Brown, nominated for “Sensational” alongside Nigerian singers Davido and Lojay.

Essentially, all five nominations in the Best African Music Performance category are Nigerian pop or Afrobeats songs. For a category that’s meant to cater to the wide variety of popular music coming out of an entire continent, the Grammys clearly didn’t get the memo that African music isn’t just Afrobeats. Or, maybe they did, and decided to do what many western institutions tend to do with African music these days: flatten it to fit their neat ideas.

It’s like beating a dead horse, but it still comes back to the fact that Afrobeats does not and will never capture the truly colorful and incredibly diverse music coming out of African. Part of that is because it’s a term that was foisted on music from a part of the continent, for easy classification, crossover appeal and commercial viability. That’s why any style of music from the non-West African parts of the continent that doesn’t easily fit that nebulous idea of Afrobeats has struggled to gain institutional recognition, even if they are popular beyond their point of origin.

When Tylawon the first Grammy for Best African Music Performance, there wasn’t anything to hold that win up against. Many people were simply basking in the euphoria of Africa getting its first dedicated category at the Grammys. In retrospect, the South African singer being the only non-Nigerian nominated feels like the category was created with Afrobeats as the sole focus.

Tyla’s “Water” can best be described as pop-piano – which is essentially Afrobeats-ish. Also, following her win, there was outrage from Nigerians who believed she didn’t deserve to win over her competitors – almost claiming that any win in the category is a birthright for Afrobeats, Nigerian Afrobeats specifically. In a notable rant, British Nigerian media personality and host of the The Afrobeats Podcast, Adesope Olajide, accused the Grammys of using Nigerian artists for promotional purposes, simply because an African that isn’t Nigerian dared to win an Africa-focused award.

Even now, some Nigerians online are trolling Tyla for not being nominated this time around, with X user @korie_tweets basing his banter on a disingenuous interpretation of the singer’s recent statement on Afrobeats. At least, it’s certain that a Nigerian will win this time around – the worst case scenario is that it will be split with an American artist, which is feasible since “Sensational” is arguably the most popular song nominated. Many people argued that Tyla won because “Water” was a global hit.

In a huge shocker, though, Tyla didn’t get any nominations despite having a strong year that includes winning Best New Artist at other western awards and dropping a debut album packed with catchy songs. “Jump” is the kind of hit song that could easily have been nominated, it peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard Afrobeats chart and is still in the top ten.

Another shocking snub is Ayra Starr. The Nigerian Beninese singer has had a banner year so far, centered around her wonderful sophomore album, The Year I Turned 21, easily one of the best African albums this year. Starr has spent 2024 expanding her global reach, so it makes sense to expect that she would’ve been nominated even beyond Best African Music Performance.

To be fair, even if the award were nominally focused on Nigeria, it would always be a headache to select five songs to be nominated. Even with all the cultural and spiritual qualms with Afrobeats, it’s undeniable that a lot of Nigerian artists make great music. However, this award isn’t meant to solely recognize Nigerian music or even Afrobeats.

It’s egregious that an Africa-focused award isn’t recognizing amapiano, which is easily the biggest genre on the continent. (Again, Afrobeats is not a genre.) It’s not just that even the Afrobeats are co-opting ‘piano at a high rate, it’s the plain fact that the biggest songs on the continent are South African amapiano jams.

For example, TitoM and Yuppe’s “Tshwala Bam” is one of the very few pan-African hits this year, and it’s one of several songs that should’ve gotten a nod. You could make the same argument, to lesser extents, for Uncle Waffles’ viral hit “Wadibusa,” and even Kabza De Small and Mthunzi’s “Imithandazo,” the huge hit that recently won song of the year at the South African Music Awards.

While there might be a perspective that the academy based their nominations on merit, it’s barely hidden that popularity plays a big role in being nominated for and winning a Grammy. In fact, the all-Nigerian nomination is proof of that. However, popularity seems to come with a caveat in the case of this Grammy category: if it isn’t Afrobeats (or Afrobeats-sounding), it won’t be nominated.

At this point, it’s foolhardy to expect the Grammys and many other western music award bodies to do better with representing music from the continent, but it will always be important to repeat this: African music is way more than Afrobeats.