25 wins five
Adele makes a clean sweep at th e 2017 Grammy Awards.
THE 59th Grammy Awards ceremony turned unequivocally political nearly three hours in, with hiphop collective A Tribe Called Quest’s performance, in which one of the troupe members called out angrily to “President Agent Orange.”
It was among several moments when musicians voiced concerns about executive orders and other policy statements from President Donald Trump since his inauguration on Jan 20.
As for the awards themselves, one of the big winners was David Bowie, who died early in 2016, just as his final album, Blackstar, was released.
Going into the ceremony, the story line was Adele versus Beyonce, but as the evening progressed, the pendulum swung strongly in the direction of the British singer-songwriter.
She won early for pop solo performance and vocal album, then took the first win in three additional marquee categories in which she was vying with Beyonce, her hit Hello winning the song of the year award.
It also turned into a big night for Chance the Rapper. His debut album, Coloring Book – which prompted the Recording Academy to change its eligibility rules on how music is released – was crowned best new artiste.
Because Coloring Book was available only as a free stream, the academy altered the long-standing requirement that music considered for awards be available in physical form, an acknowledgement of the shifting tide of consumers’ preferred way to listen.
Greg Kurstin, who produced the tracks Hello and Water Under The Bridge from Adele’s 25, was named non-classical producer of the year.
Beyonce, who led nominations with nine, meanwhile, took a single award in the early going, winning the music video Grammy for Formation. She added a second during the telecast, collecting the urban contemporary album Grammy for Lemonade.
In accepting that award, Beyonce said, “We all experience pain and loss and often we become inaudible. My intention for the film and album was to create a body of work that will give a voice to our pain, our struggles, our darkness and our history, to confront issues that make us uncomfortable.
“It’s important to me to show images to my children that reflect their beauty,” she continued, “so they can grow up in a world where they look in the mirror, first through their own families, as well as the news, the Super Bowl, the Olympics, the White House and the Grammys, and see themselves. And have no doubt that they’re beautiful, intelligent and capable.
Beyonce finished in runner-up position in three other categories in which she had been nominated, including pop solo performance for her track Hold Up from her Lemonade album.
Actress-singer Jennifer Lopez introduced a note of social com- mentary in her presentation of th he best new artiste category winner r, saying, “At this particular point i n history our voices are needed more than ever. As Toni Morriso on said, ‘This is precisely the time when artists go to work – not when everything is fine, but in times of dread.’”
A few minutes later, Beyonce elicited gasps and cheers from th he audience with her conceptually ambitious nine-minute performance medley of Love Drought and Sandcastles from Lemonade, , which is vying for album-of-theyear honours.
Likewise, in the rock performance category, where sh e was in the running with her trac ck Don’t Hurt Yourself with rocker Jack White, the Grammy went posthumously to Bowie for the title track from his final album, Blackstar, which generated four Grammys ahead of the telecast: rock performance, alternative music album, recording package e and non-classical engineered album.
The fifth Grammy for rock son ng gave Bowie’s album a perfect fiv efor-five win ratio.
Beyonce also came in behind the Beatles for the music film Grammy, which went to the Ron Howard-directed documentary, The Beatles: Eight Days A Week — The Touring Years.