Disco trailblazer Donna Summer, country-music queen Tammy Wynette, pioneering gangsta rap group N.W.A. and performance artist-turned-sonic-maverick Laurie Anderson are among the Recording Academy’s 2024 Special Merit Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award recipients. Summer was the subject of the 2017 LA Jolla Playhouse production, “Summer: The Donna Summer Musical.”
They will be be celebrated at an afternoon ceremony in Los Angeles on Feb. 3, the day before this year’s Grammy Awards take place. The other 2024 Lifetime Achievement honorees being feted by the Recording Academy — under whose auspices the Grammys are presented — include Motown singing great Gladys Knight and The Clark Sisters, who are top-selling female vocal group in gospel-music history.
“The Academy is honored to pay tribute to this year’s Special Merit Award recipients — a remarkable group of creators and industry professionals whose impact resonates with generations worldwide,” Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason in a statement released Friday.
“Their contributions to music span genres, backgrounds and crafts, reflecting the rich diversity that fuels our creative community. We look forward to honoring these music industry trailblazers next month as part of our week-long celebration leading up to Music’s Biggest Night.”
Six other awards will be presented at the private, non-televised Special Merit ceremony, which is held at Los Angeles’ historic Wilshire Ebbell Theatre.
Trustees Awards will go to hip-hop godfather DJ Kool Herc, veteran entertainment attorney Joel Katz, and producer and manager Peter Asher, who helped guide the careers of Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor — and who achieved pop music success of his own in the 1960s as half of the chart-topping English duo Peter & Gordon.
This year’s Technical Grammy Award honorees are Tom Kobayashi and Tom Scott, who together launched the Entertainment Digital Network, or EDnet, which uses fiber-optic networks to quickly send high-quality video and audio over great distances.
The Feb. 3 ceremony will also include the presentation of the Best Song for Social Change Grammy Award, a new category that debuted last year. The 2024 recipients — for the inspirational song “Refugees” — are K’naan, Steve McEwan and Gerald Eaton.
Four of this year’s honorees — Summer, Wynette, Kobayashi and N.W.A member Eazy-E — are being honored posthumously. Two of the honorees, Anderson and Karen Clark-Sheard of The Clark Sisters, are 2024 Grammy nominees.
The Grammy’s first Lifetime Achievement Award was presented in 1963 to Bing Crosby, who was instrumental in the 1937 opening of the Del Mar Racetrack. Since then, a number of former San Diegans have received the honor.
They include: Doors’ singer Jim Morrison; Frank Zappa; John Stewart and Nick Reynolds of The Kingston Trio; Indian music giant Ravi Shankar (who was a longtime Encinitas resident); Patti Page; Tina Weymouth of Talking Heads; and sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart.
The 2024 Grammy Awards will be held Feb. 4 at Crypto.com Arena and will be televised on CBS and streamed on Paramount+. Air time is 5 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., PST. Trevor Noah will host for the fourth consecutive year.
