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I was not surprised to find out that this year's Grammys were a wash as usual -- but I was amazed to learn that the bulk of the awards went to an artist whose music is mostly acoustic. Norah Jones' name is now all over the place -- and just yesterday I never heard of her. I thought for sure the awards would go to one of the industry's carefully formulated teenage darlings, with a well-sculpted body, too much makeup and no talent -- like Britney Spears or Avril Lavigne -- but I was wrong. As it turns out 8 awards went to Norah Jones, whose music (I just discovered) is simple, acoustic and folky-ish. In my opinion, it's pretty bland and forgettable, but the point I want to make is that it doesn't fit the Britney mold, which is a good thing. It's even described as Jazz, although despite the Blue Note label, I wouldn't go that far, except to the extent that the backing band uses a traditional jazz lineup: drums with brushes, upright bass, hollow-body guitar and straight piano, and features a few jazz session heavies, like drummer Brian Blade and guitarist Bill Frisell. Jones, it turns out, is also the daughter of the famous Ravi Shankar, Indian sitar god and guru to the likes of the Beatles and John Coltrane. For better or for worse, this quote from an AP article sums it up well: "One of my colleagues told me that Norah was so far from what his bosses were looking for last year that he would have been fired if he had signed her," said Arif Mardin, who won producer of the year Grammy for his work on Jones' album. "Now, his bosses are saying, 'Go out and find me a Norah Jones.' "

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