Grammy Execs Respond to Backlash After Few Women Win Awards in Male-Dominated Show

You may have noticed the hashtag #GrammysSoMale trending during the 2018 Grammys on Sunday night (January 28), and that’s because Alessia Cara (Best New Artist) and Little Big Town‘s Karen Fairchild and Kimberly Schlapman (Best Country Duo/Group Performance) were among the few women to win during the broadcast.

Grammys execs are now responding to the backlash.

“It has to begin with… women who have the creativity in their hearts and souls, who want to be musicians, who want to be engineers, producers, and want to be part of the industry on the executive level… [They need] to step up because I think they would be welcome. I don’t have personal experience of those kinds of brick walls that you face but I think it’s upon us – us as an industry – to make the welcome mat very obvious, breeding opportunities for all people who want to be creative and paying it forward and creating that next generation of artists,” Recording Academy president Neil Portnow told Variety when asked about the hashtag trending.

Grammys producer Ken Ehrlich also responded, saying, “It’s not for me to talk about. I produce the TV show.”

When asked why Lorde wasn’t given stage time to perform despite her Album of the Year nomination, he said, “I don’t know if it was a mistake. These shows are a matter of choices. We have a box and it gets full. She had a great album. There’s no way we can really deal with everybody.”

You can see the full winners list here.