After a four-year hiatus, the Grammy Awards will return to New York next year for the 45th annual ceremony - and it was a simple phone call from new Mayor Michael Bloomberg that sealed the deal.
"Only a couple of days after he was elected, the mayor called me up in the most humble tones," said Michael Greene, head of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, in announcing the Grammys return to Madison Square Garden.
"We talked about the importance of bringing the Grammys back to New York," Greene said Wednesday. "To New York - you ve got a great new mayor."
The smiles were in contrast with the animosity between Greene and ex-mayor Rudolph Giuliani , who had accused the academy chief of unleashing a stream of obscenities at a mayoral staffer back in 1998. Greene denied the allegation; Giuliani called him a liar.
When the Grammys moved back to Los Angeles the next year, Greene said the Giuliani dust-up was not a factor. But the Grammys stayed in California for the duration of the Giuliani administration.
Bloomberg deflected suggestions that his approach - conciliatory rather than combative - had lured the Grammys back. The Grammys return said nothing about the two mayors differing styles, Bloomberg insisted.
"No matter who s mayor, the Grammys should come to New York," Bloomberg said. "The Grammys belong here because this is the musical center of the world."
Giuliani, through a spokeswoman, declined comment. Greene - who arrived for the news conference at The Theater at Madison Square Garden in a yellow taxi - was effusive Wednesday in his praise of the ex-mayor.
"The way that Rudy Giuliani handled the last year of his mayoral term was brilliant," Greene said. "We re very, very thankful to the mayor for the things he did."
The 2003 show, the ninth time the Grammys will have come to New York, will be held Feb. 23. It will be the first time the Grammys are broadcast on a Sunday night.
The annual show generates an estimated $40 million for the local economy.
U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, also attending the news conference, said the return of the Grammys was particularly significant while New York rebounds from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center .
"New York always wants the Grammys," Schumer said. "But this year New York needs the Grammys."
Grammy-winning singer Marc Anthony , a native New Yorker , joined Sony Music head Tommy Mottola in presenting Bloomberg with an autographed guitar from Les Paul s personal collection.
The guitar, which features a Sept. 11 scene painted on it by a retired city firefighter, will be auctioned, and the proceeds donated to a fund benefitting widows and orphans of the trade center rescue workers.
Greene has said he would like to alternate the show between New York and Los Angeles.