Microsoft announced today that its MSN Music online music service will give away one GRAMMY-nominated song each day, beginning tomorrow and running through Saturday, the day before the GRAMMY Awards. Each track the company is giving away is nominated for a best song award in a specific category.
"The GRAMMY Awards celebrate the best music has to offer, and now music fans can enjoy our picks for the best of the best--absolutely free," Rob Bennett, senior director of MSN Entertainment, said. "This is also an excellent opportunity for people to discover songs they might not have tried before--so pop fans can check out an outstanding country song, or rock fans can discover some of the year's best hip-hop."
MSN Music will use the following schedule for the free song downloads: Tomorrow: Best Male Pop Vocal Performance/Best Female Pop Vocal Performance; Wednesday: Best Rock Song; Thursday: Best Rap Song; Friday: Best R&B Song; and Saturday: Best New Country Song. The MSN Music editorial team will select the songs, which will be announced each day.
In related news, Apple Computer is again partnering with soft drink giant Pepsi-Cola in a Pepsi iTunes Music Promotion marketing campaign in which one of every three bottles of Pepsi and other soft drinks will contain a code for a free song download from the Apple iTunes Music Store. You might recall that Apple partnered with the company a year ago in a similar but mismanaged campaign that fell far short of expectations. Since that time, however, the Apple iTunes Music Store has established itself as the dominant online music service.
