In a night with many stars performing and accepting awards for their work in music over the past year, it was Adele and Beyonce who stood out from the rest.
Adele swept the top honors, including song of the year, record of the year, and best pop solo performance for “Hello” and album of the year and best pop vocal album for her album “25.”
Adele opened the awards by performing “Hello” and also performed a tribute to deceased musician George Michael, in which she sang his song “Fastlove.” Midway through her tribute, Adele stopped the performance saying “I can’t mess this up for him” and then restarted her song.
And although Adele took home the biggest awards, Beyonce still had some of the spotlight on her, even being mentioned by Adele in two of her speeches. The expecting mother performed two of the lesser known songs from her hit album “Lemondade,” “Love Drought” and “Sandcastles” and her nine minute performance was well received. Beyonce also took home two awards, best music video for “Formation” and best urban contemporary album for “Lemonade.”
Though she was one of the favorites for the bigger awards of the night, Beyonce couldn’t come away with one, continuing her quest for the elusive album of the year. In Adele’s speech after winning the award, she claimed that she herself had wanted Beyonce to win and even voted for her over herself, and then split her award in half, whether this was intentional or not was not mentioned. During Adele’s speech, Beyonce could be seen visibly mouthing the words “I love you” a touching show of support and love between two of the biggest pop superstars of our generation.
The other big winners of the night were David Bowie, who received his awards posthumously for his album “Blackstar” and Chance the Rapper, who took home three awards including “Best New Artist.”
Chance the Rapper, who is a Chicago native, was the first independent artist to ever win a grammy. The rules were changed, largely because of Chance’s popularity, to allow independent artists to be eligible for consideration. A personal favorite of mine, Chance’s award and performance were highlights in a night filled with them.
Another highlight of the night was the politically charged performance of A Tribe Called Quest and Anderson .PAAK, which ended with frequent Tribe collaborator Busta Rhymes shouting “President Agent Orange” and Q-Tip saying “Resist! Resist! Resist!” Besides this performance, the Grammys remained largely apolitic, with most artists choosing not to comment on Donald Trump and his administration, a rarity in this award show season.
Late night comedy show host James Corden hosted, and infused a bit of humor into an otherwise serious night. Corden largely succeeded in his efforts as host, and was a better choice than previous CBS host LL Cool J.
With a variety of performances and awards, the 2017 Grammy’s proved to be captivating, and a worthy celebration of the musical talent that our generation has to offer.
Featured image courtesy of Reuters
