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      Annie Lennox Honors Sinead O’Connor at Grammys

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      In an emotional ode to Sinead O’Connor at the Grammys, Annie Lennox performed “Nothing Compares 2 U,” the Irish singer-songwriter’s cover of the Prince original that became a No. 1 hit.A forceful performer known for her lilting voice and her political provocations, O’Connor died in July at 56. Her rendition of “Nothing Compares 2 U,” her best-known track, highlighted her ability to veer from breathy high notes to penetrating, heavy vocals, delivering performances with an emotional gut punch.There was a bit of irony in Lennox’s performance: In 1991, the year that O’Connor won the Grammy for best alternative music performance — for the album “I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got,” which featured “Nothing Compares 2 U” — she boycotted the ceremony over what she called the show’s excessive commercialism.In a fitting tribute, Lennox took a moment at the end of her performance for an antiwar statement, saying, “Artists for cease-fire,” in reference to the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.O’Connor had a tendency of turning public performances into headlines, famously ripping up a photo of Pope John Paul II on “S.N.L.” in protest of sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church. As Amanda Hess wrote in a 2021 profile of O’Connor, the act was more personal than it may have seemed. Her mother, who the singer said in her memoir had physically abused her, died when O’Connor was 18. It was her mother’s photo, plucked from a bedroom wall, that O’Connor destroyed on national television.“I’m not sorry I did it. It was brilliant,” she said. “But it was very traumatizing.” Her career never recovered, but she felt a sense of freedom. “I could just be me,” she wrote in her book, “Rememberings.” “I’m not a pop star. I’m just a troubled soul who needs to scream into mikes now and then.”In the days and months following O’Connor’s death, which a coroner later said was the result of natural causes, scores of artists spoke of her bravery and pure talent.Lennox, a Scottish singer-songwriter who started her own solo career around the time of O’Connor’s rise, posted to social media a moving tribute to the singer after she died, calling her raw, fierce and brilliant. More

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      Taylor Swift Announces New Album, ‘The Tortured Poets Department,’ at Grammys

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      As she accepted the Grammy for best pop vocal album for “Midnights,” Taylor Swift announced that she would be releasing her new album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” on April 19.“I know that the way that the Recording Academy voted is a direct reflection of the passion of the fans, so I want to say thank you to the fans by telling you a secret that I’ve been keeping from you for the last two years,” Swift said. “Which is that my brand-new album comes out April 19. It’s called ‘The Tortured Poets Department.’”Swift said she would post the album’s cover from backstage when she was done accepting the prize.Going into the night’s awards show, Swift fans had noticed that the artist had changed her profile picture on X, Instagram and Facebook to a black-and-white version, and many interpreted this as a hint that Swift would announce a new “Taylor’s version” of her “Reputation” album, which has a black-and-white cover.Swift received six Grammy nominations, including nods for “Anti-Hero” in the best song and record of the year categories and a nomination for “Midnights” in the album of the year category.“This is my 13th Grammy,” Swift said in her speech. “This is my lucky number, I don’t know if I’ve ever told you that.” More

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      Killer Mike, boygenius and SZA Are Among Early Grammy Winners

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      Of this year’s 94 Grammy categories, all but nine were given out during a fast-paced, nontelevised ceremony, where some stars (Billie Eilish, Joni Mitchell, boygenius) showed up to accept their awards, but many others (SZA, Michelle Obama) didn’t.The tallies for the early awards gave no clear advantage to any artist. SZA, the night’s most nominated artist, with nine citations, won two (progressive R&B album and pop duo/group performance, with Phoebe Bridgers) but lost three, which puts her in a challenging position going into the main ceremony.The indie-rock trio boygenius won three early prizes, including best rock song, rock performance and alternative music album (for “The Record”). Dressed in identical white suits, with black ties and pink carnations, the band’s three women ran excitedly to the podium and gave emotional speeches.“We were all delusional enough as kids to think this might happen to us one day,” Lucy Dacus, one group member, said.Songs from “Barbie” — which logged 11 nominations total, including some multiple nods in individual categories — took two prizes early in the night. Eilish and her brother, Finneas, were present to accept the award for best song written for visual media, for “What Was I Made For?”“I want to thank our parents,” Finneas said. “Our dad who worked as a construction worker at Mattel Corporation for much of our childhood to keep food on the table. That’s very sick. Thank you for parenting us.”Jack Antonoff — the producer of Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey and other stars — won producer of the year, non-classical, for the third year a row.Although this nontelevised segment is seen by few fans, it can feature notable, heartfelt speeches. Mitchell, 80, accepting the award for best folk album, for “Joni Mitchell at Newport,” a live recording of her surprise comeback appearance in 2022, said: “We had so much fun at that concert, and I think you can feel it on the record. It’s a very joyous record because of the people that I played with and the spirit of the occasion was very high. And it went onto the record. Even the audience sounds like music.”Killer Mike, the Atlanta rap veteran and political activist, was up for three awards in the rap field for music from his album “Michael” — rap album, performance and song — and he won all three.In a passionate series of speeches, his head covered in sweat, he exhorted: “For all the people out there that think you get too old to rap, [expletive]!” He added: “Dreams come true! It is a sweep! It is a sweep! It is a sweep!” More

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      2024 Grammys Winners: Updating List

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      A complete rundown of the artists, albums, songs and videos that took home trophies at the 66th annual awards.The 2024 Grammys taking place Sunday night in Los Angeles honor recordings released from Oct. 1, 2022, through Sept. 15, 2023. SZA is the lead nominee, with nine nods for her album “SOS,” which topped the Billboard 200 for 10 straight weeks.The R&B singer Victoria Monét and the indie rocker Phoebe Bridgers of boygenius both have seven, while Jon Batiste, boygenius, the Americana singer-songwriter Brandy Clark, Miley Cyrus, Billie Eilish, Olivia Rodrigo and Taylor Swift have six nods apiece.Here are the winners so far:Producer of the Year, Non-ClassicalJack AntonoffSongwriter of the Year, Non-ClassicalTheron ThomasBest Pop Duo/Group Performance“Ghost in the Machine,” SZA featuring Phoebe BridgersBest Dance/Electronic Recording“Rumble,” Skrillex, Fred again.. and FlowdanRead our profile of Fred again..Best Pop Dance Recording“Padam Padam,” Kylie MinogueHear the “Padam Padam” Popcast.Best Dance/Electronic Music Album“Actual Life 3 (January 1 – September 9 2022),” Fred again..Best Rock Performance“Not Strong Enough,” boygeniusRead our review of boygenius’s album.Best Metal Performance“72 Seasons,” MetallicaRead our feature on Metallica’s set lists.Best Rock Song“Not Strong Enough,” Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus, songwriters (boygenius)Hear the boygenius Popcast.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Michael Watford, a Minister of Gospel House Music, Dies at 64

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      His signature hit, “So Into You,” was omnipresent in 1994 — the rare record “you heard at every club,” one D.J. said. But his time at the top was brief.Michael Watford, a church-trained club singer whose baritone boomed over the world’s dance floors for much of the early 1990s, and in the process helped birth a subgenre of club music known as gospel house, died on Jan. 26 in Newark. He was 64.His cousin Lorie Watford said the cause of his death, in a hospital, was dementia.Mr. Watford’s signature hit was “So Into You,” a jubilant ditty that paired his romantic, yearning vocal, inspired by Luther Vandross, with insistent strings, a lush piano line, and frequent handclaps and drum rolls. It hit No. 1 on the Billboard dance chart in April 1994, only to be replaced a week later by Barbara Tucker’s “Beautiful People” — on which Mr. Watford provided backing vocals.“There were different styles among house D.J.s, and different songs that appealed to their particular crowds,” said Tony Humphries, a D.J. and producer who helped push Mr. Watford to the top of the dance-music heap by playing his early records on his weekly radio show on WRKS (Kiss-FM) and during his marathon sets at Club Zanzibar in Newark (where the video for “So Into You” was shot). “But there was a smaller number of records everyone had to have, songs you heard at every club, and ‘So Into You’ was absolutely one of those.”Little Louie Vega, a producer and D.J. who between 1992 and 1994 had his hand in more than a dozen songs that reached the top of the dance charts, said of Mr. Watford: “He comes from church. You could tell that from the way he sings, and he brought that to the music.” Mr. Vega worked with Mr. Watford on “My Love,” a song from his first and only album, “Michael Watford,” released by EastWest/Atlantic in 1994.Michael Wayne Watford was born in Suffolk, Va., on July 20, 1959, but grew up largely in Newark. His mother, the Rev. Betty Brower of the Clinton Memorial AME Zion Church, was a gospel singer who performed in the 1970s with the Alvin Darling Ensemble. His stepfather, George Brower, was also a gospel singer.He is survived by his mother; two younger brothers, Duncan and Terrance Artis Watford; his children, Michael Watford Jr., Symphony Watford and Taylor Watford; and two stepsiblings, Ruby Washington and Erroll Brower. His marriage to Joanne Collins ended in divorce. We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      These Keyboard Musicians Are Thinking Beyond the Piano

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      Phyllis Chen began studying the piano at age 5, learning from a strict, traditional teacher who taught her the standard repertoire. She was a passionate musician, but sometimes wondered how much of her playing was artistic, rather than purely athletic.“I never found it to be entirely fulfilling,” Chen said in a video interview. “I always thought there was something missing.”Chen, 45, was pursuing graduate studies at Indiana University when she first encountered the toy piano, an instrument with a brittle, xylophone-like sound usually around 20 inches long, with a range of three octaves. Her teacher, the virtuoso pianist André Watts, was a Liszt specialist but encouraged her to pursue her own interests.Once, Watts tried Chen’s toy piano; the keys were so small and his hands so big that he struggled to play a single note at a time. But for her, playing the unusual instrument was liberating. “I was very excited to be able to explore without all of the traditional boundaries being tied to it,” she said. “No one was going to tell me: ‘This is the canon of works. This is how it needs to be played.’”She is among the growing number of keyboardists expanding their practice beyond the modern piano — that instrument so central to classical music, with its large and historically important repertoire, orchestral heft and essential role in teaching. But for these pianists, learning to play other keyboards has been invigorating. On these less prominent instruments, they have explored unfamiliar timbral terrain, re-examined their approaches to canonical works and created new repertoire. They return to the modern piano with greater aural and tactile sensitivity, feeling a renewed sense of freedom and purpose at the instrument.Chen was a founding member of the International Contemporary Ensemble in 2001. A few years later, she was extremely busy, traveling between New York and Chicago to perform and attending university in Bloomington, Ind., when she got tendinitis in both arms.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      After UMG Pulls Its Music, TikTok Users Encounter Silence

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      Content creators say they are considering the merits of Instagram and YouTube after a licensing battle led TikTok to pull songs by artists with Universal Music Group.When TikTok users open the app these days, they encounter a platform stripped of music by many of their favorite artists. Dancers bob and sway without a beat drop. People lip-sync to silence.Because of a licensing rift between the platform and Universal Music Group, which releases music by Playboi Carti, Taylor Swift, Drake, Ariana Grande and others, TikTok confirmed on Thursday that it had deleted music by Universal artists from its library and muted previously published videos that used those songs.Music from artists affiliated with Sony and Warner remains available on TikTok. But that did not stop some users from declaring they were departing to a rival platform, Instagram Reels, while others have made fun of Universal’s absence by dancing to songs in the public domain. The dominant feeling is frustration: What was the point of TikTok without one’s favorite melodies?“A lot of trends that have gone viral are of people who have millions of views on a single video because of an audio,” said Myah Elliott, 22, who pointed out that the TikTok logo looks like a musical note. “It’s going to be muted. That’s a scary thought.”For more than two years, 21-year-old Evan Cronin posted videos on the first of each month that show him going through a morning routine, garnering millions of views. Around midnight on Thursday, he published the latest in the series to the beat of Playboi Carti’s “Sky.”This time, there were barely any interactions from viewers.“It was essentially a dead post,” Cronin said.After TikTok removed Universal’s music, those who use the app to listen to their favorite songs or discover new artists expressed disappointment. Others publicly shared concern about the detrimental effect on emerging Universal artists who rely on TikTok for publicity.Shawn Desman, a Canadian artist, explained to his followers why his videos had been muted and bemoaned that he no longer had the ability to share his music through TikTok.“It is such an important tool for us to promote ourselves, our music, our creations,” Desman said in the video. “It’s just really crazy to me that now we’re not going to be able to use our music.”The sudden silencing of Universal’s music catalog also left TikTok’s content creators worried and exasperated. John Casterline, who has 3.5 million TikTok followers, said that at least 10 percent of his videos had been muted, resulting in a steep drop-off in views. He has contemplated pivoting to YouTube.“The minute TikTok mutes a video, they’re obviously not going to push it out to the ‘For You’ page,” said Casterline, 20, referencing the app’s algorithm-based recommendation feed. “Everything completely halts. So it’s definitely made my account take a massive hit.” More

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      Taylor Swift Makes Fox News Suddenly Hate Celebs in Politics

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      The news network that wants Taylor Swift to stick to singing has had no problem handing conservative celebrities the microphone.Taylor Swift, you may have noticed, is everywhere: packing arenas on the Eras tour; filling theaters with her concert film; popping onto your TV screen from a luxury suite at Kansas City Chiefs games, cheering on her boyfriend, Travis Kelce.And now she’s living rent-free in Fox News hosts’ heads.After reports that the Biden re-election campaign was angling for an endorsement from the superstar (who backed President Biden in 2020), commentators on the network strapped on their culture-war helmets. “Don’t get involved in politics!” Jeanine Pirro urged her. “We don’t want to see you there!” Another commentator, Charly Arnolt, pleaded, “Please don’t believe everything Taylor Swift says.” Sean Hannity addressed the issue in prime time: “Maybe she wants to think twice.”Fox’s anxiety attack follows months in which MAGA opinionators have spun baroque conspiracy theories about the power couple: that Ms. Swift and Mr. Kelce’s romance was staged; that the N.F.L. was rigging the Super Bowl for the Chiefs; and that it was all an unholy plot to supercharge an eventual Biden endorsement. The Fox host Jesse Watters even flirted with the speculation, floating the idea that Swift’s success was a psyop masterminded by the Defense Department.In retrospect, “Paul is dead” lacked imagination.Of course, people are entitled to their opinions on celebrity political speech or the possible existence of a secret Pentagon diva lab. But if Fox News’s hosts truly believe that it’s irresponsible and dangerous to invite celebrities to weigh in on politics, they might want to turn their attention to … Fox News.Over the years, Fox has invited Gene Simmons, the bassist of Kiss, to talk about the handling of an Ebola outbreak. It had the fashion model Fabio on to blame crime in California on liberalism. It gave us Kid Rock on cancel culture. Last year, the actor Jim Caviezel declared Donald J. Trump “the new Moses” on “Fox & Friends.”And let’s not forget that Fox was instrumental in the entry into politics of a certain TV celebrity, whom you might know better as the candidate Mr. Biden will likely be running against.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More