The 65th annual Grammy awards commenced at the Crypto.com arena in Los Angeles on Feb. 5 . Big stars like Taylor Swift, Bad Bunny, Harry Styles and Beyonce attended. 

The Grammys are a music award show commemorating and acknowledging outstanding artists from the past year. The first Grammy show was on May 4, 1959. Since then, the award show has evolved by inviting more artists and recognizing more music. Beyonce was the star of the event this year, walking away with four out of her nine nominations for her album “Rennaissance.” She is now the most decorated artist with 32 grammy wins in her career. The Maverick City music group also walked away with four wins. 

There was lots of Latino culture present, with Latin music star Bad Bunny performing and winning one out of his three nominations. “Bad Bunny opening was a perfect segway into the event and portrayed Puerto Rican cultured in the best way” sophomore Miguel Uriarte-Giron  He opened up the show with an electrifying performance that got everyone up and dancing. Artists like Taylor Swift and Jack Harlow were dancing the whole time. This performance stirred up some controversy when Bad Bunny was performing and the broadcasted TV captions said, “speaking non-english,” which left artists and viewers disappointed that the Grammys didn’t pay for closed captioning. The rapper 50 Cent said on Instagram, “Bad Bunny bigger than everybody right now and you can’t pay for closed captioning. What is this speaking non english. FIX IT.”

Trevor Noah hosted the show for the third consecutive year. This year was the 50th anniversary of the Rap category, and six-time Grammy winner Questlove put together a beautiful segment commemorating the genre. Various performances from artists like Busta Rhymes, Queen Latifah, Lil Baby and more entertained viewers. “I think it was cool to show all the influential rappers during the Grammys to celebrate all the people involved in making this type of music,” junior Rishi Iyer said.

A legendary tribute was given to people in the music industry who died in 2022. The standout performance from the tribute was from Migos rapper Quavo. His nephew and fellow artist in Migos, Takeoff, died on Nov. 1. Quavo sang a beautiful rendition of “Without You,” al tear-jerker that made listeners appreciate every day that they are alive. 

The highlight speech of the show was from Kim Petras and Sam Smith, who won best pop duo/group performance for their song “Unholy,” which reached number one on the Billboard Top 100 in both the U.S. and UK.  Smith graciously let Petras take the stage and accept the awards as the first transgender woman to win in the category.  “Thank you. I just want to thank all the incredible transgender legends before me who kicked these doors open for me so I could be here tonight,” Petras said. 

She dedicated the award to her friend Sophie who died two years ago. Sophie was an electronic producer and artist who paved the way for Petras to make it in the industry. “She told me this would happen and always believed in me. Thank you so much for your inspiration. Sophie, I adore you and your inspiration will forever be in my music,” Petras said. 

While Petras had a beautiful acceptance speech, she and Smith were subjected to criticism over their performance. Many believed it to be satanic, and Madonna, who introduced it, also received backlash for saying, “Are you ready for some controversy.” Petras and Smith received support from the LGBTQ+ community and many more.

The big four awards went to Lizzo (Record of the year), Bonnie Rhett (Song of the year), Samara Joy (Best New Artist), and Harry Styles (Album of the year). The show introduced a new fan segment where 10 fans were brought in a room and each of them represented one of the 10 nominated artists in the album of the year category. Each superfan talked about their life story and how the artist impacted them as a person and why they believed the artist should win. There were mixed reviews for this new concept. Some fans liked it, while others thought it took up time and wasn’t needed. The show ended with a beautiful eight-minute performance presented by DJ Khaled for his song “God Did,” with a lineup of Jay Z, John Legend, Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, and Fridayy.