Inside the arena where three of Los Angeles' pro sports teams reside, the Recording Academy was passing out their Grammy trophies for the 66th time Sunday night. "Music's Biggest Night", they called it. And for most of those three-and-a-half hours of CBS' prime time, it actually lived up to its billing. For a change.
But first, we have to address the elephant in the room. The woman who dominated music in 2023 with her prolific albums, headline-making concert tour and a romance with a football star made history once again. Taylor Swift became the first person to win four Grammys for Album of the Year, this one for "Midnights". She won two awards for the evening, one of which was used to plug her new album coming out in April. She was also accused of ignoring presenter Celine Dion on stage to accept her album Grammy, but that turned out not to be true. Such is life for a global superstar, and it sounds like there's more to come.
Billie Eilish and Miley Cyrus also won two trophies each, one of them being for a major category:
- Eilish's contribution to the "Barbie" movie soundtrack, "What Was I Made For?" in her trademark breathy voice, won for Song of the Year (which, as host Trevor Noah has to explain to CBS viewers, is a songwriting award), which was co-written by her and brother Finneas O'Connell.
- Cyrus' "Flowers", the biggest hit of her career, was named Record of the Year. I think she's ready for her Las Vegas residency.
Best New Artist went to Victoria Monet.
As for everything else that went on . . .
- Tracy Chapman, who apparently doesn't get out much, performed her 1988 hit "Fast Car" with the guy who revived it, Luke Combs. Really an unfair comparison.
- Joni Mitchell, who last received a Grammy more than 50 years ago and is now an 80-year old legend, returned to the stage with"Both Sides Now".
- Olivia Rodrigo, who most music pundits have bequeathed the honor of The Next Taylor, found a way to clean up her language in the made-for TV version of "Vampire".
- Billy Joel closed the show first with an unremarkable song that was his first new one in three decades, but redeemed himself on "You May Be Right".
- Jay-Z, the recipient of the Dr. Dre Global Impact award, used his acceptance speech to rip the Recording Academy for ignoring rap and hip hop, and to ask why his wife Beyonce's album wasn't nominated for a Grammy. His daughter Blue Ivy was standing next to him on stage.
And finally, In Memorium. Stevie Wonder "duetted" with Tony Bennett. Annie Lennox did Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U". And with Oprah introducing, Fantasia Barrino did a good job in channeling Tina Turner's singing, if not her dancing.
But again, as the performers sang, the images of those in the music business who died in the past year floated by without so much as context. Some of those artists, including Melanie and Gordon Lightfoot, deserved a better tribute. They both had long careers, but commercially peaked in the 1970s and have since been relegated to the dustbin of music history. The Grammy's main TV audience these days wasn't born then. And they wouldn't have known who Melanie, Gordon Lightfoot and the others were unless their elders told them.
The Grammy awards this year were all that. And Taylor, too.
