Female Power Reigns At 2021 Grammy Awards—A Stark Contrast From Previous Years
On March 14, music fans tuned into the 63rd annual Grammy Awards.
Beyoncé won four Grammy awards—Best R&B Performance, Best Rap Song, Best Music Video and Best Rap Performance. They bring her lifetime total to 28. She now holds the record for the most Grammys won by a female artist.
Female artists also won all four of the big categories—Record, Album and Song of the Year, and Best New Artist.
Billie Eilish won Record of the Year for Everything I Wanted. Taylor Swift took home Album of the Year for Folklore, her first Grammy win since 2016. H.E.R. won Song of the Year for I Can’t Breathe, a song honoring George Floyd. Megan Thee Stallion won Best New Artist. She is the first female rapper to take home the award since Lauryn Hill in 1999.
The wins were a big departure from previous awards shows. The Grammy Awards has faced backlash from the music industry for many years with accusations of having a history of racism, sexism and having a voting system that is built on favoritism.
Canadian pop singer The Weeknd broke chart records with his song Blinding Lights after it spent a year on the HOT 100’s top ten list. Last month, he also played the Super Bowl halftime show. Yet, he wasn’t nominated for a single award.
After the Grammys announced their nominations back in November, The Weeknd took it upon himself to call out the award show by stating that The Grammys “remain corrupt.”
This isn’t the first time that celebs have called out the Grammys.
Just last year, Tyler, the Creator called out the Grammys after his win in best rap album of the year category. He felt his album, Igor, was falsely categorized as rap and many other artists who look like him also frequently get thrown into the “urban” or “rap” categories based on the color of their skin and not the content of their music.
Last November, Nicki Minaj tweeted: “Never forget the Grammys didn’t give me my best new artist award when I had 7 songs simultaneously charting on billboard & bigger first week than any female rapper in the last decade – went on to inspire a generation. They gave it to the white man Bon Iver.”
Teyana M.J. Shumpert also expressed her feelings on Twitter about the lack of female artists being named finalists—they were all men—in the R&B category.
It’s clear to see that the Grammys has a lot of things going on behind the scenes that are upsetting a lot of stars who have done incredible work in the music industry.
The Grammys need to reevaluate its morals and integrity to make it a more inclusive experience for all. One that isn’t focused on race, favorites or the networking political power of celebrities.
