Steve Jobs, the former founder and chief executive of Apple who died in October, is to be given a posthumous Grammy Award for his contribution to music.He will be recognised by America’s top music industry awards event for changing the way music is consumed and edited with the iPod, iTunes and Apple’s editing technology.
Jobs’ estate will be given a Trustees Award on February 11th, the day before the awards show.
Grammy called Jobs a “creative visionary”, whose innovations “revolutionised the industry and how music was distributed and purchased”.
Indeed, TV presenter Philip Schofield once made an April Fool’s on children’s TV about a device that could store hundreds of tunes as though it was impossible. Today, the iPod is for many people the only way to listen to music on the go.
It comes after Apple was awarded a Technical Grammy Award in 2002 for contributions of outstanding technical significance to the recording field, as many music producers and amateur musicians use Apple software to edit music.
The iTunes online music platform has also helped to reduce the amount of music piracy around the world and music executives and songwriters are undoubtedly indebted to Jobs for the platform.
It has also led to other IT giants following in the footsteps by offering cloud-based music stores. Amazon is readying itself to fully launch the Cloud Player, which is integrated with the new Kindle Fire, while Google Music has also launched a free music store and storage library.
Other special recipients at this year’s Grammys will include Diana Ross, who in almost 50 years in the industry has sold more than 100 million albums and countless awards. Still touring today, she will receive a Lifetime Achievement Award.
Rock group the Allman Brothers Band, Glen Campbell and country artist George Jones will also receive a Lifetime Achievement Award.
Another posthumous award will be given to Antonio Carlos Jobim, who is most well-known for writing The Girl From Ipanema.