There were so many firsts at the 63rd annual Grammy Awards Sunday night — the first ever held during a global pandemic — it was a challenge to keep track of them all, starting with Beyoncé and Taylor Swift.
Beyoncé won two awards on her own, including for Best R&B Performance for her inspirational song "Black Parade," and shared two more with Best New Artist winner Megan Thee Stallion for "Savage." Those wins helped Beyoncé surpass bluegrass queen Alison Krauss, who has 26, and tied her with legendary producer Quincy Jones. Only the late classical-music conductor Sir Georg Solti has more victories, with 31.
"As an artist, I believe it's my job, and all of our jobs, to reflect the times, and it's been such a difficult time," said Beyoncé , who entered the evening with a field-leading nine nominations. "So I wanted to uplift, encourage, celebrate all of the beautiful Black queens and kings that continue to inspire me and inspire the world."
Swift, in turn, won Album of the Year for her rootsy and understated "Folklore." That made her the first female artist to win that category three times and tied her with Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon and Frank Sinatra.
Reflecting the fact that the album was made largely online and long distance because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Swift acknowledged one of her collaborators by saying: "I want to thank Justin Vernon — I'd still love to meet you some day."
Because of the pandemic, it was the first edition of the Grammys to take place without an audience, apart from the honorees who performed and applauded each other. It was also the first to be held in and around the 720,000-square-foot Los Angeles Convention Center — which was standing in for the adjacent Staples Center, the usual site for the 3½-hour awards marathon that ran over by 13 minutes — and the first where nearly all but a few awards were presented outdoors on one of the center's balconies.
Most of the performances were held inside the center on five stages, set up in a circle that placed each stage at a significant distance from the others. Even more notably, this was the first iteration of the Grammys at which many of the performances at the telecast — long billed as "Music's Biggest Night" — were pre-recorded and filmed in advance.
By one tally, 18 of the 23 performances were shot ahead of time, although the producers declined to disclose how many were actually live. The amount of lip-synced performances, by BTS, Dua Lipa, Haim, the politically charged rapper Lil Baby and more, also seemed to set a new record for miming on a show that has long prided itself for showcasing real-time live performances. But during a time of pandemic, the adherence to health protocols was a safe and sound move.
It was also the first Grammys at which some of the awards were presented not by music stars and Hollywood celebrities but by on-hiatus employees of such shuttered music venues as New York's historic Apollo Theater, Nashville's Station Inn and Los Angeles' The Troubadour and Hotel Café. Only a handful of artists — including Ringo Starr, Lizzo, Jacob Collier and Jhené Aiko — served as presenters.
And it was the first Grammys hosted by comedian Trevor Noah and produced by "The Late Late Show with James Corden" and "Carpool Karaoke" producer Ben Winston, an Englishman who injected fresh and welcome energy despite the surfeit of pre-recorded performance segments.
Tragically, it was also the first at which a number of of the nominees — including reggae pioneer Toots Hibbert and Americana-music legend John Prine — won posthumously (twice in Prine's case) after dying from COVID-19 last year.
And, during the livestreamed pre-telecast portion of the show, which drew an audience of more than 12 million, it was the first with remote acceptance speeches from winners' homes. The worldwide media members, who usually cover the Grammys in a backstage media center, instead did so online via a virtual press room. The members of the few camera and video teams permitted on site Sunday had to test negative for COVID and undergo mouth swabbing and temperature test before being admitted — the same protocols taken for the artists and production staff.
Underscoring the epic proportions of the devastating pandemic — which prompted the six-week postponement of Sunday's telecast from Jan. 31 to Sunday — it was the first edition of the Grammys in which the show's "In Memoriam" segment was expanded to 13 minutes, about four times as long as on the 2019 Grammys telecast.
Sadly, this was the second consecutive year in which the Grammys was marked by loss. Last year's telecast at the Staples Center took place the same day that basketball legend Kobe Bryant, his daughter and others died in a helicopter crash.
The enormous impact of the Black Lives Matter movement was reflected by Lil Baby's galvanizing performance of "The Bigger Picture" and a segment near the end of the show that saluted Beyoncé's "Black Parade." In addition, 23-year-old Bay Area singer, songwriter and guitarist H.E.R. shared a Song of the Year win with co-writer Tiara Thomas for "I Can't Breathe," a song whose creation — like that of Swift's entire "Folklore" album — was done online.
"We wrote this song over FaceTime," said H.E.R. (real name Gabriella Sarmiento Wilson) as she accepted the award. "I didn't imagine that my fear and that my pain would turn into impact, and that it would possibly turn into change. We are the change we wish to see. That fight that we had in us the summer of 2020, keep that same energy."
Speaking backstage later to reporters in the Grammys' virtual press room, she elaborated, saying: "It really means the world because when we wrote the song it came from a conversation and we honestly were coming from the perspective of our own personal feelings and then it turned into being part of the movement and being part of history.
"I think this song is going to be a stamp in time and people are going to think of this song when they think of George Floyd, when they think of Breonna Taylor, when they think of all these people that we're still fighting for."
But perhaps the most memorable commentary on racial injustice and perseverance came during the livestream-only Grammy Premiere Ceremony from veteran singer Bobby Rush, whose "Rawer Than Raw" won Best Traditional Blues Album honors Sunday.
"I've been Black for 87 years," said Rush, who then invoked last year's death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. "And a foot has been on my neck for nine minutes."
If Rush was the night's oldest winner, Beyoncé's daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, was the youngest. The 9-year-old shared a Best Music Video for with her famous mom and WizKid for "Brown Skin Girl."
