Beyonce Sets History with 6 Wins

If only the record industry itself had enjoyed that same kind of rebound in 2009. Nielsen SoundScan reported last month that overall music sales made a slight bump, up 2.1 percent from '08 to '09, but not enough to alleviate the industry's increasingly foul mood. Album sales continued their seemingly irreversible free fall, dropping a sobering 12.7 percent. Digital singles sales are up, however, with over a billion sold in 2009, a record.

So while the Grammys are intended to recognize "artistic excellence," it's no koinky-dink that acts such as Swift, the Black Eyed Peas and Gaga dominated this year's nominations. Those three, along with Jackson, racked up the most digital track sales in 2009.

But the boost in singles sales is still just the silver lining in the very dark cloud that continues to hover over the music industry -- a cloud that continues to change the definition of what a Grammy actually means nowadays. If sales can't serve as a barometer for what makes pop music popular, can a shiny gold trophy?

The Grammys have often been criticized for doling out the biggest awards to artists many years (sometimes even decades) past their prime. Recent album-of-the-year awards have gone to Alison Krauss and Robert Plant in 2009 and Herbie Hancock in 2008. The Grammys' inclusive 2010 slogan, "We're All Fans," seems to acknowledge that people under the age of 45 listen to music, too.

This must be a particularly frustrating development for Kanye West. His masterful if not experimental "808s & Heartbreak" was overlooked for an album-of-the-year nod. It was the first album of his career that wasn't nominated for the top honor.

In general, rap music was kinda snubbed, so the rappers snubbed back. Jay-Z didn't show up when "D.O.A. (Death of Auto-Tune)" won for best rap solo performance. Other winners, including Eminem, Dr. Dre, 50 Cent, Kanye West and Rihanna, didn't show up for their pre-televised victories, either. On the broadcast, Jay-Z and Rihanna accepted the award for best rap/sung collaboration. The single "Run This Town" also featured a collaborator that was conspicuously absent from the ceremony: West.

A svelte Maxwell took the stage to accept the first two Grammys of his career -- a win for best male R&B vocal performance for the song "Pretty Wings," and one for best R&B album for his excellent "BLACKsummers'night."

It was a mixed bag for Washington-area artists and labels. Los Texmaniacs' "Borders y Bailes" album on Washington's Smithsonian Folkways Recordings won best Tejano album. A kids' disc from Maryland duo Cathy & Marcy with Washington's Christylez Bacon lost the best children's musical album award to Ziggy Marley. Composer John Musto's opera "Volpone" lost for best opera recording -- that performance was recorded at Virginia's Barns of Wolf Trap and released on Wolf Trap Recordings.