In a preview clip for the Recording Academy’s upcoming “A Grammy Salute to 50 Years of Hip-Hop,” rap pioneer Huge Daddy Kane succinctly sums up the night’s significance: “This night time is one thing particular. You get to see so many generations of hip-hop artists on one stage. That exhibits unity, and I feel it’s stunning.”
When the telecast airs this Sunday (Dec. 10) at 8:30 p.m. ET/8 p.m. PT on CBS and Paramount+, viewers will see and listen to for themselves simply how particular an evening it was. Over the course of two hours, a who’s who of rap legends, DJs and next-gen stars numbering near 60 — from Roxanne Shanté, De La Soul, Too $hort, Queen Latifah, MC Lyte and Widespread to Nelly, Rick Ross, 2 Chainz, Gunna, Latto, GloRilla and extra in between — got here collectively to rap their approach via a 50-year refresher course/residing historical past lesson for OG and present followers alike. Or what the Recording Academy is billing as a “once-in-a-lifetime dwell live performance particular.”
In fact, two hours isn’t lengthy sufficient to completely embody all of rap’s trailblazing artists, legacy-building moments and cultural influence. That’s one thing the particular’s host and government producer LL COOL J addressed in his opening remarks in the course of the taping of the particular at Hollywood Park’s YouTube Theater in Inglewood, Calif., on Nov. 8.
“Are you all able to rejoice the music that modified the entire world perpetually?” he requested the enthusiastic viewers. LL, who additionally performs on the particular, then famous, “And whereas it’s not attainable to have each [rap] artist right here, it’s flowers for all!”
Monie Love, Widespread, and Queen Latifah attend A GRAMMY Salute to 50 Years of Hip-Hop at YouTube Theater on Nov. 8, 2023 in Inglewood, Calif.
Monica Schipper/Getty Photos for The Recording Academy
The primary flowers of the night saluted the ladies of hip-hop throughout a roof-raising phase that included Queen Latifah, Monie Love, Spinderella, MC Lyte and Remy Ma, in addition to rap touchstones comparable to Latifah and Love’s 1989 gem “Women First.” Subsequent up: a salute to hip-hop’s regional roots across the nation, starting from New York, Atlanta and Texas to Memphis, Miami and the West Coast. Amongst these repping for his or her areas have been Jermaine Dupri, Jeezy, T.I., Boosie Badazz, Public Enemy’s Chuck D and Taste Flav, E-40 and Warren G.
Chloe Bailey, Jennifer Hudson and Questlove, who additionally government produced the particular, have been among the many artists who launched the varied live performance segments. D-Good and Doug E. Recent saluted the style greats who’re now not right here.
Viewers of “A Grammy Salute to 50 Years of Hip-Hop” will even be handled to performances by different trailblazing rap teams comparable to De La Soul, Arrested Improvement and Digable Planets. However by far, one of many buzziest and most anticipated performances of the night was delivered by Will Smith and DJ Jazzy Jeff. In a full-circle second, the pair reunited as DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Recent Prince. They obtained the first-ever Grammy for greatest rap efficiency in 1989. Nonetheless, the duo boycotted that 12 months’s ceremony to protest the class presentation not being televised. Now, some 34 years later, Jeff and Smith proved what a missed alternative that was as they reeled off a number of hits — together with “Summertime,” “Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It,” “Miami” and the theme tune for Smith’s ‘90s tv sequence The Recent Prince of Bel-Air — to viewers screams and a sustained standing ovation.
“It’s vital for the Recording Academy to commemorate [50 years of hip-hop] as a result of it’s such an enormous a part of our business,” says the group’s CEO Harvey Mason jr. within the preview clip. “It’s the authenticity. It’s the storytelling. It’s the emotion that has permeated a number of different genres.”
