People Come Together To Celebrate Music’s Biggest Night

By Lorena Coleman

The 56th Annual Grammy Awards aired on Sunday, Jan. 26, and received mixed reviews. Music stars from every genre gathered at the Staples Center in Los Angeles to perform and celebrate the year’s musical accomplishments.

The ceremony opened with a performance by Beyonce and Jay-Z. Viewers then listened to an opening monologue by host LL Cool J, who also hosted the Grammy’s in 2013. In the monologue, Cool J complimented many of the nominees and other music artists who had a successful year in the music industry. The rest of the first hour was filled with a performance by Lorde of her smash-hit “Royals”, the debut of an inspirational song by country singer Hunter Hayes and a performance by Katy Perry singing “Dark Horse”. Other names that performed throughout the telecast were Keith Urban, John Legend, Taylor Swift, Kacey Musgraves, and Metallica.

There were also many collaborations from the likes of Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, Pink and Nate Ruess; Sara Bareilles and Carole King; Miranda Lambert and Billie Joe Armstrong; Blake Shelton with Merle Haggard, Kris Kristofferson and Willie Nelson; and the highly praised collaboration between Kendrick Lamar and Imagine Dragons. Madonna, Macklemore and Queen Latifah also collaborated performing the song “Same Love” while also marrying 32 couples during the performance.

French duo Daft Punk won the coveted award of Album of the Year, beating out fellow nominees Kendrick Lamar, Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, Sara Bareilles and Taylor Swift. Daft Punk also won Record of the Year and best dance/electronica album. Other big winners of the night were Lorde for Song of the Year and Best Pop Solo Performance, Bruno Mars for Best Pop Vocal Album, Kacey Musgraves for Best Country Album and Macklemore and Ryan Lewis for Best New Artist.

While it brought in more than 28.5 million viewers, the telecast did have its share of missteps.The main one being that the awards show turned into more of a concert than a ceremony, with a large majority of the awards given out before the show even began. This meant that the three and a half hour long show was mainly composed of a bunch of performances.

Even if you weren’t able to catch the awards on TV, social media sites like twitter gave people a minute-by-minute commentary of what was happening. This year’s show was considered the biggest social event of the season with the number of interactions during the show reaching a record-breaking 34 million. People were abuzz after every performance and award presentation, filling their twitter feeds with opinions and accolade.

No matter what music you like to listen too, the Grammy’s seemed to incorporate a little bit of every musical genre to fulfill music lover’s expectations. Every year, the Grammy’s Corporation finds a way to unite people through a common passion: music, combining innovative performances and ground-breaking moments to create an entertaining evening.