The numbers are in, and they’re higher than ever.
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An average of 16.9 million viewers tuned in to watch women dominate the 2024 GRAMMYs — up an impressive 34 percent from last year’s numbers of 12.4 million, according to Variety.
This was the awards ceremony’s largest audience in four years and the second consecutive spike in viewership, as the GRAMMYS continue to climb out of its post-pandemic hole.
The audience reached its peak during the In Memoriam segment, with 18.3 million viewers tuning in for performances by Stevie Wonder, Annie Lennox, Jon Batiste and Fantasia Barrino.
Women Owned the Night
The Recording Academy, the nonprofit organization that puts on the annual music awards, came under fire several years ago after the 2018 GRAMMYs were widely criticized for ignoring female artists.
A 2018 study by the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative underlined that disparity, finding that between 2013 and 2018 alone, only 9.3 percent of the nominees for Record of the Year, Album of the Year, Song of the Year, Best New Artist and Producer of the Year were women.
Recording Academy CEO Harvey Mason, Jr. aimed to change that, promising “a lot of different looks, a lot of different faces, ages, genders, races” during the 2024 telecast.
And indeed, women reigned supreme at the 66th annual GRAMMYs. The night featured rare show-stopping performances from two powerful female artists, Tracy Chapman and Joni Mitchell.
Taylor Swift became the first-ever artist to win Album of the Year four times, besting a trio of male legends — Frank Sinatra, Stevie Wonder and Paul Simon — who had three apiece.
Miley Cyrus, who had yet to win a Grammy prior to 2024, left with two major prizes under her belt: Best Pop Solo Performance and Record of the Year, both for her self-love anthem “Flowers.”
R&B Artist SZA, who led the night’s nominations with nine, took home Best R&B Song for “Snooze” and Best Pop Duo/Group Performance for “Ghost in the Machine” featuring Phoebe Bridgers.
“SZA’s impact has to be studied,” one user wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Featured photo by Timothy Norris/FilmMagic)
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