Rounding up recent tech news that impacts livelihoods in the creative community …

Wearables projected to grow steadily while hearables segment grows rapidly
On March 20 research firm IDC estimated that wearable devices will see five-year compound sales growth, more than 18 percent through 2021, with more than 102 million units having shipped in 2016. Most of this segment is smartwatches and fitness trackers, at least for now. Hearables — earworn devices comprising a variety of functions, from simple amplification and correction of audible sound, to seamless synchronization with a host of wireless devices for telecom, music, and gaming purposes — shipped 700,000 units in 2016. Clothing in the wearable tech category shipped 1.3 million units. Future devices are expected to converge with outerwear that supports headphones, earbuds, speakers, and helmets with audio. IDC Mobile Device Trackers Senior Research Analyst Jitesh Ubrani said the future of wearables and hearables is with a broader audience that "frequents fashion outlets over tech outlets." Separately, on March 16 research firm CCS Insight estimated that sales of hearables will rise to 11 million units by 2021.

Amazon is testing verified brand registry of leading intellectual property
To fight counterfeiting, Amazon Marketplace Vice President Peter Faricy told Reuters on March 20 that a brand registry is now in testing. As early as next month, leading retail brands are expected to be able to upload key art, report counterfeiters, and Amazon as well as its users will also be able to flag counterfeits. There will also be a label called "Transparency" available to brands that shoppers can use to compare official information with labeled merchandise. Faricy emphasized that efforts like this must be ongoing and continue to evolve in order to succeed. Making their marketplace more secure, for authorized and legitimate resellers who play by the rules, should result in immediate improvements at Amazon while serving as an influential best practice for other e-commerce retailers.

Facebook, Nielsen collaborate to measure multi-platform advertisements
On March 21, Facebook and Nielsen Catalina Solutions announced the launch of a new quantitative tool to measure advertising effectiveness on television, desktop, mobile, and combinations linking television with a second screen. Reporting on tests, Facebook by itself did better than just television, but the two in combination consistently did better than either by itself.

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For decades, Yo-Yo Ma's life has been a Möbius strip of meetings and concerts and airport terminals. Then COVID-19 washed away that hurry-up-and-wait existence for a while.

At his Cambridge home in a snarl of wildlife, the 18-time GRAMMY winner and 27-time nominee crossed into a realm of self-examination. He took inventory of his life history, including his immigrant background, lifelong friendships and role as a 65-year-old classical musician and public figure. Ma also mulled over the Zen Buddhist concept of a beginner's mind. This means a consciousness open to new ideas, unfettered by preconceived notions and eager to play and explore. 

This idea is central to Yo-Yo-Ma: Beginner's Mind, the latest entry in Audible's Words + Music series where Ma explores his roots, relationships and place on Earth in the 21st century. It's always been essential to his art, too. "A beginner's mind is something that I have to practice each time I perform," he reveals to GRAMMY.com. "It doesn't matter… what I did last night or during the full day. I could have played really well last night, but it doesn't matter. What matters is how present I am at the moment of performing."

Beginner's Mind isn't just for Ma fans; it's a must-hear for anyone feeling encumbered by world events and yearning to see the world anew. GRAMMY.com caught up with the one-of-a-kind cellist to discuss how he linked up with Audible, the nexus of music and nature, race relations in America and setting up youngsters to be stewards of the planet.

The cover image to Yo-Yo Ma's Audible Original: Words + Music: Beginner's Mind.

How are you doing?

I'm OK. I'm happy spring is here. Are you in New Jersey?

I am. I'm in Hackensack, and I can see the trees blooming outside my window.

Oh, that's fantastic. I heard the cherry blossoms have blossomed earlier than they have in 1,200 years.

Incredible. Why do you think that is?

I have no idea. It must be the water! [long belly laugh]

As good an explanation as any. Are you in New England?

Yeah, I'm in Cambridge.

Have you lived there a long time?

Yeah. A long, long time. I went to college in the area in the early '70s. And when I was married in '78, we lived in Cambridge, moved away for a while and then moved back again. So it's been kind of off and on for many decades.

It's certainly a beautiful time to be in this area. I listened to your Audible Original three times. I thought it was beautiful and heartening. How did you link up with Audible for this project? Had you done anything like this before?

You know what's funny? I subscribe to Audible, so I've listened to a lot of historic books. Sometimes, on long car trips, my wife and I would listen to some of the books. We've listened to Hamilton and George Washington and Rust, I think,was another book, and just varied things over the years. 

On my own, I heard James Taylor's [Audible Original, Break Shot: My First 21 Years] maybe a year ago or something. I loved it. I thought, "Gee, that's a very neat thing." So when this came up as an idea, I sort of already had heard the format and thought, "Gee, that's really neat." So I welcomed the chance to put some thoughts down and here we are.

Three times! Are you crazy?

I wanted to prepare! So they approached you, or vice versa?

Yeah, they approached me. I think maybe they had seen a lecture that I had given in Michigan and they thought, "Oh! We might ask this guy to do something." I didn't particularly think… Maybe a lecture would be interesting, but somehow it turned into this.

It's certainly a unique format. How did you come up with the central thesis?

It didn't start with the central thesis, but more or less, I wanted to describe a number of long-term friendships and sort of get to the idea of [incredulous laugh] "How did I become this? This 65-year-old guy thinking the way I do?" Because I didn't always think the way I do, right?

I think the pandemic lent itself to making some forays into self-examination—'Wait, what happened 50 years ago?' I was doing these digital platform concerts with Emanuel Ax, who's featured in it, and it's almost now a 50-year friendship. And I did Songs of Comfort and Hope with Kathy Stott; I've also known her for over 40 years. 

And so to be able to work with them during this time and to talk made me think, 'You know? That'd be really great.' Because I treasure these friendships. They're amazing people, musicians, artists—but most of all, friends, and we went through a lot together. So by process of thinking about what we were doing together during this time as well as reminiscing, I sort of got to talking about this sordid life I've been living for years!

I was going to ask how you settled on four stories to tell. But by the way you describe these four essential friendships, it must have been a no-brainer as to who you'd focus on.

Absolutely. There are good things and bad things about touring, and what I've always noticed is that when you move around a lot, the coincidences multiply. 

At first, you think, "Oh my gosh, this is crazy! How come I just met so-and-so at an airport or some random place? How come we bumped into one other? What a coincidence!" But after the fortieth or fiftieth time, you realize, "You know what? That's probably because I'm not stationary. The fact that I don't stop moving [means] the chances of bumping into people multiply.

So many people have influenced me. Certainly, Kathy and Manny, but I thought about the move, being an immigrant, going to college, for example. They also changed me. They really were fundamental in directing my focus on whole different ways of thinking. I mentioned Marlboro [Music School and Festival]; I mentioned the Kalahari [bushmen]. These were seminal moments that changed the way I would think from then on, after that experience.

Yo-Yo Ma in the Kalahari Desert, 1993. Photo courtesy of Yo-Yo Ma.

Early on, you quote something the physicist Richard Feynman told you: "Nature has the greatest imagination of all, but she guards her secrets jealously." What does this mean to you or elicit in your mind?

Oh my goodness. Well, first of all, I think from a musical point of view, we're taught, in a way: "Don't play anything unless you can hear it first." Music, for me, is always—first of all, it stimulates the imagination. And I end up thinking that sound is, in a way, the interpretation of something else. Something that's imagined.

There are some people that think music is just sound, and it's sound for sound's sake. That's absolutely possible, but I think I have a preference for teaching that music also is a translation of thoughts and ideas and feelings and structures and energy and space and time. 

And through sound—the manipulation of sound—you can express all of these things and the person's inner core, or a society's soul or you can represent peoples' voices when they no longer exist or whose voices have been taken away. 

So, nature—I always think that if you think of sound as energy, the phrasing of something always can be described as something in the physical world, as something we've actually experienced. Therefore, when you then tie two notes together for a phrase or to get to a groove, you are trying to replicate, to get into the pocket of that feeling, of that sense. And that is what makes music alive, in my opinion.

Therefore, Richard Feynman saying "Nature has the greatest imagination"—yes, we want to have the greatest imagination possible, and we want to, in fact, practice and discipline our imagination so we can extract something from our experience and then be able to replicate it and get other people into that same state of mind that you are in when you work.

The fact that Richard Feynman—a physicist—said that was extraordinarily helpful to me. In saying, "Yeah, that's right! So it's not about Bach and Beethoven and Bob Dylan and whomever." Yes, it's their genius, but they're also extracting things from nature. And we're part of nature, too. What we extract, we can actually focus on and transmit to another human being. That information, that knowledge can live in somebody else. And my job as a performer is to make that transfer possible.

I looked into the concept of a beginner's mind a little bit. It comes from Zen Buddhist philosophy. And in the Audible Original, you discuss its meaning and extol its value. In your mind, how can we retrieve and restore this ability in adulthood after all these filters have stacked on each other?

One way I try to do it in performance is that often, as musicians, we play at night. We play after we've experienced, often, a full day. I don't know about you, but at 6 p.m., my mind is cluttered from a whole day where things have happened. What we try to do as performers is to have a clear mind and start with a clean slate.

Taking a nap in the afternoon is really important to me because it declutters the mind. I can start the day over in preparation so I can be fully present when I start to play the concert: "I'm going to tell you this story; this is how it begins." And if I have a full day of dreck in my head—of stuff that's gone on—it's going to be harder for me to get to the narrative and be totally present.

So, a beginner's mind is something that I have to practice each time I perform. Because, actually, it doesn't matter to you, if you're in the audience, what I did last night or during the full day. I could have played really well last night, but it doesn't matter. What matters is how present I am at the moment of performing.

And from a slightly different point of view, I think it comes down to first principles. What are the first principles for a musician, or for a physicist, or for a scientist? What's your North Star if you are a leader or if you are a teacher or a doctor? For a physician, maybe it's the Hippocratic Oath. And for a scientist, you want to find the closest thing that can be replicated according to a certain number of conditions of something you're testing. And it has to be true every time you have those conditions. You can't fake your data.

So, what is the most important thing you have to start with? Associated with a beginner's mind is the idea of first principles—which comes from science, but are values that come from philosophy, ethics, religion, society. "Do unto others," right? Society has those principles and we know what they are. 

The question is, are we practicing those things constantly? Because that's what we need to do to build something that people can trust.

Yo-Yo Ma and Emanuel Ax. Photo courtesy of Yo-Yo Ma.

From what you're describing, it sounds like a beginner's mind is easily transmutable to anything, from loving somebody to designing a space shuttle. Anything a human can do can be graceful thanks to first principles.

Yeah, absolutely. And you can see the limitations of that at the beginning of meeting somebody. 

I can tell you, for example, I was kind of shocked when you said you had listened to this thing three times. You could have listened to 20 minutes of it and done an interview. But you didn't. That said something. So either you had nothing better to do and it was set on perpetual play, or you wanted to listen to it. And, my goodness. So, you cared. Maybe I'm taking an overly positive view, but "Oh, wow. Morgan cared." That's amazing because you did more than you needed to in order to get something done. That says something about you and affects how we have our conversation.

I appreciate that, Yo-Yo, because I did care. I took notes and thought about it and slept on it. This was in my hope to elevate it from a good interview to a great one.

But little things, right? You reveal something about your principles when you do little things.

Your first story in the Audible Original is about your family's emigration to the U.S. As you tell it, you and your mother took to this new beginning while your father stayed a little staunchly stuck in his ways. It seems like what you're saying here is that by showing up and leaving the door open to new possibilities is paramount to being a successful and thriving individual. What's your take on that?

I both believe in the goal and process. I think both are incredibly important. I think living fully, the process allows you to reach a goal that actually may change because of the process. I think when you are open to things, that's very often what can happen with ultimate goals. They have shifted.

I think I remember Stephen Colbert saying that he started out as an actor. He wanted to be a serious actor and if you asked him at age 22, "So, you think you want to have a comedy show?" he'd say "You're crazy." But he did it very seriously, the acting bit. And one thing led to another, so he ended up in a goal in an unexpected place. I think my father had more specific goals, and he also was trying to provide for his family. He had to immediately use whatever skills he had [to do so]. It's not like he had immense choice in the matter. 

Hopefully, I'm not at the end of my life. But by the time I do get to the end of my life, I don't know whether I look back and compare what my father might have thought at the end of his life; we may have ended up in the same place. I don't know. Or we may have ended up in very different places. 

And what success might mean for each one of us could be so different because his life was so completely different from mine. What he lived through was something I can hardly imagine. Even for someone who has a good imagination, it's hard to imagine the period of that century that he went through.

When I survey notable people I admire, I've noticed that in youth, they typically wanted to be in a different field than the one we know them for. One of my favorite authors, the media theorist Douglas Rushkoff—do you know the name?

Yep. Yeah.

His roots were in acting, too, but he held onto that sharp left turn. And now, he gives his talks with that theatrical flair. It didn't just go away even though he chose a different path.

Oh, that's neat! That's neat! You know, some of my closest friends that I met in college struggled so much thinking "I do this. I love this. I don't know what to do. People say I have to choose." For two of my friends, it was between music and medicine. They're very talented musicians; they also wanted to be physicians. 

And what they ended up doing—they ended up being physicians, but 30 years later, they ended up being able to incorporate music into the medicine they practice and to incorporate medicine into the music they perform, thereby creating unique careers. They created a place in the universe that didn't exist before from making a fusion of two interests that people did not necessarily think went together.

Yo-Yo Ma at the Trent School in 1962. Photo courtesy of Yo-Yo Ma.

Perhaps it's easier to make that pivot when you're young. In your Audible Original, you say that upon moving to America, you faced a dizzying array of subtle differences from the shape of cheese to cardboard milk cartons instead of glass bottles. Instead of being paralyzed by culture shock, though, these differences fueled your imagination. You were young, though; can an adult cultivate this attitude toward the world?

I say in the Audible [Original] that the time in your life that you need something new can also affect people very differently. You can go from one space to another space at exactly the same time, but if it's in a different time in your life—my biological family reacted to that very differently. 

So for me, it was the fact that adults actually, sometimes, would talk to me and not talk at me. I liked that. I thought "Gee, that's possible." I didn't know that was possible before. It made a deep impression and made me like this place a lot and want to be part of this place. Rather than feeling that I'm an outsider in this place, it made me want to belong to this place because there was something incredibly attractive about it.

I want to touch on the book The Lies That Bind: Rethinking Identity, which you mention in the Audible Original.

Oh, I love that book!

It'll arrive in the mail soon! Why does the phrase "Why am I me?" resonate with you? Concurrently, when you consider a lifetime of music and self-examination, have you landed on any ballpark percentage of how much nature versus nurture you are?

That question will probably never get resolved.

Sure.

I see different slivers of it at different times. For example, I may think one thing, but I'm also a grandfather. My wife and I have two children and my daughter now has three grandchildren. We see in both our children different traits of us—and I won't tell you whether they're the good traits of the bad traits! [laughs]

Also, we see this in our grandchildren! We also see traits that possibly come from my wife's father. Their great-grandfather. So definitely, there are personality traits and things that supersede nurture. But I also think that on another level, how important the construction of values [is]. Or when you start with certain values, the lives that get constructed are a result of nurture. 

I think values play an incredible role as genes do. Experience can lead them to make a 90-degree turn, which changes their life, but they're still guided by the values and still have the genes that they came from. So, those are also interesting experiments.

At the end of the Audible Original, you note that "recognizing our shared humanity has never been more central to our survival," and that knocking down racial, gender-based and religious boundaries is conducive to that. Right now, I see a lot of obsession with racial difference, even when it's in the service of "anti-racism." "As a Mexican person, as a Black person, as a white person, as an Asian person..." Is there a productive way to acknowledge our differences without driving artificial wedges between people?

What's interesting is that the United States is not the only multi-ethnic society. Ancient Rome was multi-ethnic. For a while, Rome also was subject to very specific laws that gave rights and privileges to Roman citizens. But you're asking a different question.

I think it's very important to go into the weeds and try and figure that out from our immediate time frame. But I also value perspective. I value the perspective that time can give as well as different disciplines. We can look at ourselves biologically. If we look at ourselves genetically, the huge chasms in racial-ethnic differences become minuscule. 

[We can] look at humanity and our present world from, let's say, what I experienced in Ecuador. When I asked Ecuadorians "What do you think about post-colonial history?" the Ecuadorians looked at me and said "You know, we have a 12,000-year history. 500 years is just not very long." 

I was really stumped. I thought, "Damn, we [might] discover more and more about our past because we have so many ways of knowing about digging into mounds and ice-core samples and we know about tree rings and [radioactivity]—all kinds of data searching." For example, we know what the Iceman ate for his last meal from what they figured out from his stomach.

So if every country started its history from 12,000 years ago, that would put our world religions in a much smaller sliver of history. It changes your perspective. Carl Sagan used to talk about the little blue planet. From an astrophysicist's point of view, we're just a tiny blip. Does that help solve our big problems? No, but it certainly puts our egos and self-importance in a different perspective.

I can look at life from a 65-year-old. If I talk to a 20-year-old, I have a different perspective. But the 20-year-old also has a different perspective, and it's important I listen to the 20-year-old because that 20-year-old is going to live another 60, 70, 80 years, hopefully, and will have a lot to do with shaping the world that the following generations will experience.

It's important to have those conversations so that we can encompass 100 years of experience. And that's what Indigenous folk do. They think in seven generations.

Yo-Yo Ma and his wife, Jill Hornor, at the White House in 2011. Photo: Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images​

In conclusion, let's focus on our current generation. People might be too overwhelmed or bitter or jaded to cultivate a beginner's mind. It's tough to peer into your own mind when you're dragging your kids through Zoom school. What's your advice for those people, to show them they can adopt a mental state where they feel new, fresh and excited about the world?

I think one is not to give up on your ideals. By that, I don't mean be rigid on your ideals. But never forget you always have a beginner's mind. You can be in touch with what you think is good. That doesn't change. 

I do think that Gen Zs are more in tune with their values in wanting to choose where to shop—thinking more about the food cycle and climate change and living with fewer cars and material goods. Wanting to lead a life that's less segmented, in a way that's using their values. And I think it's the job of someone like me to accelerate giving them custodial responsibility so that they can live a long time and in a way that's good for the world.

I want to encourage that generational dialogue to show that you are capable of responsible caretaking earlier on. For people like me, not to say, "You're got to wait to earn it." Bulls**t. If you can do it now, do it, and we should help as much as possible because you will make the right decisions because you're closer to not having made certain compromises that get you stuck in golden handcuffs.

Wonderful talking to you, Yo-Yo. I hope we can talk again in the future.

Sure. By the way, Morgan, since we're talking generations, how old are you?

28.

OK. Perfect. So you're just around Gen Z—a little bit above. So good luck, go do it and I hope life goes well for you.

Vijay Iyer On His New Trio Album 'Uneasy,' American Identity & Teaching Black American Music In The 21st Century

The Recording Academy reimagined everything about the 2021 GRAMMY Awards show on a more intimate scale, and the choice of presenters was no different. When it came time to announce the Best Country Album winner, the person who appeared on screen wasn't a slick Nashville superstar, but a soft-spoken, older man who's unrecognizable to a global audience but beloved in the Music City. His name was J.T. Gray, and he grinned ear-to-ear on national TV.

In a segment recorded a month prior, Gray showed the camera crew around the Station Inn, the 145-person-capacity bluegrass venue he'd owned since 1981. Despite the room receiving almost no income for a year due to the live music industry shutdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Gray was rosy about the future. "Getting to reopen the Station Inn, that's going to be a celebration like never before," he promised. "It's going to be a big party." He then announced the winner, Miranda Lambert, to the world. Gray was naturally quiet and reserved, a closed book. Not after that shoot, though.

"He was just beside himself the whole time," Jeff Brown, the Station Inn's marketing director, tells GRAMMY.com. "He just never believed it was happening. He just didn't believe that his little venue was being recognized on that kind of scale, that those many people in a place with the GRAMMYs and the Recording Academy's recognition actually paid attention. He just couldn't believe it." On Sunday, March 14, Gray astonishedly watched himself on CBS. The following Saturday, he passed away after a struggle with compounding health problems.

Gray might not get to attend the "big party" when things open up. But 9 million people heard his message.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The Troubadour offers our deepest condolences to JT Grey’s family, friends, and those at <a href="https://twitter.com/stationinn1974?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@stationinn1974</a>. JT created a special home for bluegrass, country music, and more in Nashville, TN. He leaves behind a beautiful legacy and will be missed by many.<a href="https://t.co/rGwZGuDoXK">https://t.co/rGwZGuDoXK</a></p>&mdash; Troubadour (@theTroubadour) <a href="https://twitter.com/theTroubadour/status/1374515380622794753?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 24, 2021</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

For a year, venues worldwide have been hanging on by a thread: struggling to pay their rent, waiting in vain for federal aid, and given no clear finish line as to when they can reopen. That's why, with the Recording Academy's blessing, Executive Producer Ben Winston asked Gray, as well as representatives from the Troubadour and Hotel Café in Los Angeles and the Apollo Theater in New York City, to present at the 63rd GRAMMY Awards and talk about their economic struggles during the pandemic. Together, they sounded a shared refrain to the world: We matter to our communities, and we need help.

The venues that spoke their piece during the 63rd GRAMMY Awards were members of the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA). An assemblage of independent venue owners and promoters from around the country, NIVA formed directly in response to the 2020 lockdown. "We figured we'd better find a way to come together and lobby for federal assistance," Audrey Schaefer, a board member and the Communications Director for NIVA, tells GRAMMY.com. "Because otherwise, we're all going under."

The Steel Wheels at Station Inn in 2015. Photo: Erika Goldring/Getty Images for Americana Music via Getty Images

Last year, NIVA, along with the Recording Academy and other music organizations, lobbied Congress via the Save Our Stages Act and succeeded. On Dec. 27, the decree became the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant and passed along with the COVID relief package. "In that grant fund is $16 billion," Schaefer says. "For an organization that didn't exist before … nobody gave us any hopes of being able to secure that kind of funding. But we did. We got the law passed."

However, venues have not yet seen that money. "We understand that the applications will start at the beginning of April," she adds with relief in her voice.

In the meantime, Scheafer mulled over how best to convey to the world the existential crises venues face. "I was thinking that the GRAMMYs couldn't possibly be at the Beverly Hilton like it normally is—in a big ballroom—because we can't be together," she says. "I thought, 'What if the GRAMMYs were to have the award show, and instead of having all the performances under one roof, they were to have them in independent venues?'"

To try and give this idea legs, Schaefer reached out to Daryl Friedman, Chief Advocacy Officer of the Recording Academy's Advocacy division. "He said, 'Listen, Audrey, I think that's a great idea, but they have a million great ideas. So, let me take it to them and we'll see what happens,'" she recalls. Schaefer persistently followed up. "I kept asking Daryl, 'What do you think? What are you hearing?'"

But unbeknown to her, the Recording Academy and the production team were already independently planning to highlight independent venues and their employees as an advocacy initiative and add a personal moment to the broadcast. "And then I found out that, oh my gosh, they do want to do it," she adds with awe.

Billie Eilish at the Troubadour in 2019. Photo: Neilson Barnard/Getty Images for SiriusXM

Granted, the Recording Academy didn't agree to host performances at independent venues. But Schaefer calls the idea they decided to go with "so much better." Instead, venue professionals would take viewers on a tour of their workplaces, illustrating their value to their communities and why they desperately need help. Participants included the Station Inn's Gray; Rachelle Erratchu, the night manager at the Troubadour; Billy Mitchell, the tour guide and overall house cat at the Apollo Theater in Harlem; and Candice Fox, a bartender at the Hotel Café in Hollywood.

For Erratchu, the problem extends further than keeping the lights on at the Troubadour; the entire live music ecosystem is in trouble. "We need everybody else to survive so that we can survive," she tells GRAMMY.com. "If we don't exist and all the other venues across the country don't exist, the tour circuit as we know it and have relied on it for decades won't exist anymore."

For Billy Mitchell, the Historical Tour Manager and overall global representative of the Apollo Theater who has earned the title of "Mr. Apollo," his job isn't a means to an end; he lives and breathes it. Mitchell's time at the Apollo began in 1965 when he ran errands for James Brown and his band. During the telecast, Mitchell relates a funny story of how the Godfather of Soul sent him all the way home to the Bronx to get his report card, threatening to put his job on ice if he didn't get better grades.

COVID forced the Apollo to temporarily furlough some its staff. To be forced to stop, it was heartbreaking, to be honest with you," Mitchell tells GRAMMY.com. "I give tours to people from all over the world, and they're unable to visit because of COVID restrictions and things like that." While the not-for-profit has offered digital programming in the meantime, most of it has been free as not to burden fans. Thankfully, at press time, all staff members have returned full-time.

Billy Mitchell at the Apollo Theater in 2009. Photo: Jemal Countess/WireImage via Getty Images​

The Apollo has been lucky, in a sense; corporate and private donations have kept it afloat. Still, they're not out of the woods yet. "Donations are needed so that when we do reopen, we can pump out those great shows and bring back our staff," Mitchell says. "We want to bring back our staff as soon as possible." 

In the clip played during the 2021 GRAMMY Awards show, Mitchell addressed viewers from the empty audience. "We miss our audience and we can't wait until our doors open up again," he says. "We just can't wait."

Candice Fox, a bartender at Hollywood's Hotel Café, believes there will be an outpouring of activity at her workplace once it's safe again. "I like to believe people are going to want to make up for lost time," she tells GRAMMY.com. "I know that people are itching to perform. People are so excited to experience that exchange of energy again. So, I think it's going to explode."

In line with Erratchu's thoughts on the overall music ecosystem, Fox notes that Katy Perry cut her teeth at the 65-capacity room on Cahuenga Boulevard. "She wasn't the big pop star she is now; she was just a girl with a guitar," she says. "So many artists' careers and the GRAMMYs couldn't exist without small, independent venues like the Hotel Café because you've got to start somewhere." In her clip, Fox ruminates on the regulars she's missed for a year, pouring a Boddingtons and mixing an Old Fashioned to an array of empty stools.

Sister Sparrow and the Dirty Birds at Hotel Café in 2015. Photo: Christopher Polk/Getty Images​   

At the end of every venue vignette, each venue representative announced the winner of their assigned categories: Best Country Album for Gray (Miranda Lambert's Wildcard), Best Pop Solo Performance for Erratchu (Harry Styles' "Watermelon Sugar"), Best Rap Song for Billy Mitchell (Beyoncé's and Megan Thee Stallion's "Savage Remix") and Album Of The Year for Fox (Taylor Swift's folklore). All four were thrilled to appear and encourage viewers to support their workplaces—whether by donating directly, paying for a livestream or purchasing a T-shirt. 

That way, the lights at the Station Inn, the Troubadour, the Apollo and Hotel Café can flare up again, ensuring these cultural hubs don't become figments of the past. And if you want to know how memorable the inevitable "COVID is over" parties will be, just look at Gray's blazing smile during the GRAMMYs.

"I can probably count a very [small] number of times that I've seen him truly smile," the Station Inn's Brown reflects. "But truly smiling—that's what he was doing here."

Click here to support the Station Inn.

Click here to support the Troubadour.

Click here to support the Apollo Theater.

Click here to support Hotel Café.

Click here to support NIVA.

Capturing Los Angeles' COVID-Closed Venues

Today, the Recording Academy proudly announced its official marketing partners for the 2021 GRAMMY Awards show, officially known as the 63rd GRAMMY Awards. Bulova, Facebook, IBM, JBL, Mastercard, Pandora, PEOPLE, and SiriusXM are all supporters of this year's GRAMMY Awards, as well as events taking place throughout GRAMMY Week. 

"We are fortunate to be putting on the 63rd GRAMMY Awards alongside these extraordinary brands," Adam Roth, Senior Vice President of Partnerships & Business Development at the Recording Academy, said. "They are united in their belief that music is a healing force that can bring much-needed change to our world. Our partners stand with the Academy as we work year-round to build a more diverse and inspiring world for music creators. We are thrilled to work with these industry-leading partners to excite and engage passionate music fans everywhere."

Bulova, the Official Timepiece Partner, celebrates GRAMMY-nominated artists with an exclusive watch from their music-inspired GRAMMY Edition watch collection. First-time GRAMMY Award winners will be gifted with an exclusive edition "GRAMMY Automatic" watch, infused with musical cues throughout and a "Circle of Fifths" dial design.

Learn More: The Recording Academy Partners With Bulova To Present Exclusive Edition GRAMMY Timepieces Featuring GRAMMIUM

Facebook is the Exclusive Streaming Partner of the GRAMMY Live pre-show. Music-loving Facebook Groups will have the unique opportunity to participate in the first-ever virtual Fan Zone where members will be featured in hosted segments and have their questions answered by some of their favorite GRAMMY-nominated artists. The virtual Fan Zone will be a destination throughout the night where Facebook Group members can engage on in-show performances and award winners. GRAMMY Live will stream to the GRAMMY Awards Facebook page at 3:30 p.m. PT on Sunday, March 14.

IBM, the Official Cloud & AI Partner, launched GRAMMY Debates with Watson, alongside the Recording Academy, an AI-curated music debate experience available to fans around the world. The experience allows music fans to contribute their individual points of view to some of the most important music-related conversations today. Additionally, the 63rd GRAMMY Awards day-of-show takeover on GRAMMY.com will be hosted for the first time entirely on the IBM Cloud.

Learn More: The Recording Academy And IBM Debut New Fan Experience Powered By Watson And IBM Cloud Ahead Of The 2021 GRAMMY Awards Show

JBL, the Official Audio Partner, presents "Tomorrow's Sounds," alongside the Recording Academy, a new program created to support the next generation of musicians and artists. Through a digital content series, JBL and the Recording Academy will highlight emerging artists and help tell their stories to a global fanbase.

Mastercard, the Official Payment Technology Partner, is the presenting sponsor of the Inaugural Black Music Collective GRAMMY Week Celebration on Wednesday, March 10. Additionally, they've partnered with the Black Music Collective to present a GRAMMY U Masterclass with multi-faceted artist Tayla Parx on Thursday, March 11. On Music's Biggest Night, Mastercard will host a Virtual Fan Wall experience for select cardholders to interact with some of this year's GRAMMY nominees. Details for all events is available on Priceless.com. 

Read: The Recording Academy Announces Official GRAMMY Week 2021 Events

Pandora launched the first-ever official GRAMMY Awards Radio, which will run from Feb. 5 through March 31. The station celebrates musical excellence and all things GRAMMY Awards including hits from GRAMMY nominees and past winners, as well as behind-the-scenes stories as told by the artists themselves. Pandora and the Recording Academy will host the Pandora LIVE Countdown to the GRAMMY Awards event at 9 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. PT on Thursday, March 11, featuring an all-female lineup of current GRAMMY nominees including HAIM, Brittany Howard, and CHIKA.

Learn More: Pandora Announces Lineup For Pandora LIVE Countdown To The GRAMMY Awards: Haim, Brittany Howard And CHIKA Confirmed 

PEOPLE, the Exclusive Magazine Partner, will livestream from the GRAMMY Awards with a pre-show featuring interviews from this year's nominees and performers. People & Entertainment Weekly Red Carpet Live: Grammy Awards will stream at 6:30 p.m. ET on people.com, ew.com, PEOPLE and EW social channels and the PeopleTV app.

SiriusXM, the Official Satellite Radio Sponsor, launched the first-ever The GRAMMY Channel— airing for a limited time March 2 through 14 on Channel 104.  The GRAMMY Channel will feature a variety of music from this year's nominees across the GRAMMY Awards' 30 Fields, all leading up to the live broadcast of Music's Biggest Night.  Listeners can also expect to hear music from GRAMMY Lifetime Achievement Honorees such as Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five, Salt-N-Pepa, Selena and Talking Heads, as well as exclusive interviews with music's biggest stars from behind the scenes at the 63rd GRAMMY Awards.

Listen Now: The Recording Academy And SiriusXM Launch The GRAMMY Channel Ahead Of The 2021 GRAMMY Awards Show

For more information on official GRAMMY Awards partners, please visit: bulova.com, facebook.com, ibm.com/grammys, jbl.com, mastercard.com, pandora.com, people.com, and siriusxm.com.

The Recording Academy will present the 63rd GRAMMY Awards on Sunday, March 14, 2021, on CBS, from 8 p.m. ET / 5 p.m. PT with Emmy Award-winning "The Daily Show" host and comedian Trevor Noah serving as host. The Premiere Ceremony will stream live on GRAMMY.com beginning at 3:00 p.m. ET / 12:00 p.m. PT.

How To Watch The 2021 GRAMMY Awards Show: A Viewer's Guide On Where To Watch Music's Biggest Night

We are currently living in an unprecedented era around music creation and touring. Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, all business has been forced to become remote, making it difficult for artists to maintain their usual level of activity. Of course, though the music landscape looks totally different right now, artists are finding new and innovative ways to get their music heard, be it through livestreams, engaging with fans via social media or launching subscription models that offer exclusive content to fans. To that end, here's a rundown of some exciting new apps and tools for recording and monetizing your music in the COVID-19 era. 

Recording Tools

There are plenty of social media options for getting your work out there: Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok and Twitch are just some of the possible platforms you can use to capture your recording. 

There's also a new all-in-one app called RMusic, which allows songwriters to collaboratively write music on the go. Not only does RMusic let you to record ideas directly onto a virtual project file, but you can punch in new lines, edit takes, invite other collaborators from your address book, type lyrics, undo takes and communicate with project members from within the app.

Live Broadcast & Streaming Channels

Facebook: According to a new Remote Musicians Handbook put together by the Berklee College of Music, Facebook is the best venue for livestreaming if your audience skews a little older. 

Instagram: Meanwhile, Instagram, which has a feature that allows other people to join your live stream as guests, is ideal for younger audiences. "Based on your social media engagement on each platform, you can make an informed decision about which platform will be best for your fans," the handbook writes. "Both of these are well-suited for unannounced livestreams as notifications will go out to engaged fans, as well as letting your fans know ahead of time when you will be streaming."

YouTube: Then there's YouTube, which offers a number of monetization options and scheduling tools, such as pre-stream and in-stream ads, donations and merch sales. YouTube will even notify your followers when you go live and will allow you to schedule a live stream ahead of time. And as the stream takes place, YouTube lets viewers ask questions and interact with the streamer. 

TikTok: If you're on the super music-friendly app TikTok, did you know that you can activate a live stream if you have more than 1,000 followers? Once watching your livestream, viewers can purchase stickers, and a portion of the money is donated to the streamer. According to the aforementioned handbook, on TikTok these purchases are made using "coins." Coins start at $0.99 for 65 coins and go up to $99.99 for 6,697 coins. In turn, users can buy stickers, called "Virtual Gifts," for anywhere from 1 to 100 coins.
     
Twitch: The video game streaming platform can be useful for engaging new fans. Because this app hosts as many as 4 million viewers at once (according to TwitchTracker) actively encourages discovering new streamers, artists can show up under Twitch's "Music & Performing Arts" section (with 2.3 million followers). Here, according to the handbook, "the music ranges from metal to violin covers to singer-songwriters, and is generally more diverse genre-wise than more mainstream platforms."

If you want to monetize your work on Twitch, know that streamers get paid when new subscribers follow them and viewers donate to the streamer. Some streamers use new followers and donations as mechanisms to unlock new content or segments. Some will take requests at certain follower count or donation levels, others run merch giveaways, or give followers access to exclusive content.

OBS Software: OBS (Open Broadcaster Software) is free and open source software for video recording and live streaming. Stream to Twitch, YouTube and many other providers.

Nugs.net: Get live music on demand. Nugs.net offers a collection of more than 15,000 full-length concert recordings from the likes of Pearl Jam, Widespread Panic, Umphrey’s McGee, Dead & Company and more. Try it free with a 30-day trial.

Houseparty: This social networking service enables group video chatting through mobile and desktop apps. Users receive a notification when friends are online and available to group video chat. 

StageIt: Founded in 2009, Stageit is a web-based performance venue that hosts paid livestreamed performances. Artists choose when they want to perform, for how long, and how much they want to charge. 

Crowdcast: This video platform hosts live video Q&As, interviews, summits, webinars and more.

Streamlabs: This streaming platform can stream audio to Twitch, YouTube and Facebook. 

BandsInTown: Use BandsInTown to promote your live stream shows. You can even engage new fans and monetize shows through BandsInTown's Twitch partnership.

Fan & Membership Platforms

Patreon: Patreon gives fans access to exclusive artist content for a monthly fee, might be the first option that comes to mind when it comes to fan and membership platforms. But Patreon is only the beginning. Gumroad lets creators offer digital and physical products for sale, while its dashboard provides insight into how your sales are doing and how fans are consuming your content.

Squarespace: Offers subscription products in their store, integrating directly with your website and can be sold alongside your other merch products. 

Shopify: For $40/month, Shopify offers apps that allow you to offer subscriptions from your Shopify ecommerce store, which is helpful if you are offering physical goods as part of your subscription. 

Bandzoogle: Sell music, merch, downloads  and tickets, commission-free. Once you add a store, you can start selling music, downloads, tickets and band merch. Monthly fees start at $8.29.

Ghost: With Ghost, which is free to join, you can publish content online, grow an audience with email newsletters and make money from premium memberships.

Memberful: Memberful helps independent publishers, educators, and creators sell memberships to their audience and build sustainable businesses. You can integrate with Wordpress, send email newsletters, create private podcasts and more. Pricing is free to start and goes up to $25 or $100 per month.

Digital Production Marketplaces, including licensing and sell music, samples, and custom sounds:

Splice: Splice Studio gives you access to millions of royalty-free samples, MIDI and presets on mobile, web and desktop for $7.99/mo. 

ScoreAScore: This music production, licensing and supervision company puts producers in need of original music directly in contact with the composers who create it.

Beatstars: Beatstars is an online marketplace to buy and sell beats.

Putting The Plan Into Action

Now that you have the tools, all you need is to put a plan into action. The Remote Musicians Handbook suggests that you first analyze your audience to get a sense of their social media profiles. Then, you may want to run an unnanounced test live stream, just to get a sense of who's showing up. Then, schedule a series of announced live streams on the platform(s) of your choice. Once livestreams are part of your routine, consider partnering with artist friends on YouTube where you can cross-promote each other's work. From there, consider monetizing your work on Patreon with exclusive content. All the while, to engage new fans, hop on music-discovery tools TikTok and Twitch.

Now that you have the resources to build a fully functional music online platform from the safety and comfort of your home, the rest is up to you. Good luck!   

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