Tag: Pop and Rock Music

Where Has Tracy Chapman Been?

Tracy Chapman’s rare public appearance at the Grammy Awards on Sunday night — where she practically stole the show performing her 1988 song “Fast Car” with the country singer Luke Combs — left many fans wondering why she had largely stepped away from music for more than a decade. Despite some scattered performances on television […]

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Taylor Swift’s Bittersweet Victory

Feb. 1, 2024, 3:00 p.m. ET Feb. 1, 2024, 3:00 p.m. ET Credit…Jason Mcdonald/Netflix, via Associated Press Oscar Bait is The Point’s series of conversations about films nominated for the Academy Award for best picture. Today, Christopher Orr, an editor in Opinion who was once a film critic, discusses “Maestro” with Vanessa Mobley, OpEd Editor. […]

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Grammy Audience Jumps to 16.9 Million

Award shows are in their rebound era. The Grammy Awards notched 16.9 million viewers on Sunday night, a 34 percent increase from last year’s ceremony, according to Nielsen and CBS, which aired the show. It was the most-watched Grammy Awards since the 2020 ceremony, shortly before the pandemic — and up significantly from 2021, when […]

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Taylor Swift Prop Bets Dominate Super Bowl Action

The Super Bowl always draws crowds to betting windows and online sports books, but some of the most talked about action this year will leave a blank space in Las Vegas. With in-person sports books limited to action on the field, Adam Burns, the sports book manager for BetOnline.ag, found himself capitalizing on the moment […]

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Tracy Chapman and Luke Combs Gave America a Rare Gift: Harmony

When a beloved artist who has not performed live in some time returns to the stage, we often expect them to appear fragile, unsteady, ill at ease. But during Sunday night’s Grammy Awards, when the camera first pulled back from a tight shot of a woman’s fingers picking a familiar riff on an acoustic guitar […]

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The Grammys Aim for a Big Tent, but Not Everyone Feels at Home

Sunday night at the 66th annual Grammy Awards, Jay-Z accepted the Dr. Dre global impact award, a sort of éminence grise prize. He’s previously won 24 Grammys, but he did not treat the moment like a homecoming. Instead, he used his speech to alternately nudge and excoriate the Recording Academy, the body that awards the […]

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U.S. Plans More Strikes, and Storm Slams Los Angeles

The New York Times Audio app is home to journalism and storytelling, and provides news, depth and serendipity. If you haven’t already, download it here — available to Times news subscribers on iOS — and sign up for our weekly newsletter. The Headlines brings you the biggest stories of the day from the Times journalists […]

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Best and Worst Moments From the 2024 Grammys:

The most awards at the 66th annual Grammys went to Phoebe Bridgers, who picked up three with her band boygenius and one for a feature on a SZA song. SZA, who came into the night with the most nominations, was shut out of the biggest honors — for album (which went to Taylor Swift’s “Midnights”), […]

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Grammys 2024 Takeaways: Taylor Swift Makes History in a Big Night for Women

Women thoroughly dominated the 66th annual Grammy Awards on Sunday, with a history-making album of the year win by Taylor Swift and victories by Miley Cyrus, Billie Eilish, SZA, Lainey Wilson, the Colombian pop star Karol G and the band boygenius. The wins capped a year when women were extraordinarily successful in pop music, and […]

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Grammys 2024 Red Carpet: See Photos of the Looks

Musicians are a colorful crowd, and as the Recording Academy doesn’t hesitate to remind audiences at every opportunity, the Grammys are “music’s biggest night.” So it may be little surprise that previous Grammys red carpets have been the site of such unforgettable looks as Cardi B swanning about in archival Mugler and Shania Twain cosplaying […]

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Taylor Swift Makes Fox News Suddenly Hate Celebs in Politics

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 […]

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Grammys 2024: How to Watch, Time and Streaming

The 66th annual Grammy Awards, taking place on Sunday at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, is poised to be a big night for young women. SZA is the top nominee, with nine nods for her album “SOS,” which topped the Billboard 200 for 10 straight weeks. Taylor Swift, who rocked the entertainment world with […]

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How Adele Springsteen Gave Bruce His Rock ’n’ Roll Spirit

Joy and despair, vitality and darkness course through Bruce Springsteen’s songs. The joy, he told the world, came from his mother, Adele Springsteen, who died on Wednesday at 98. When he accepted the Ellis Island Family Heritage award in 2010, Springsteen brought his mother onstage with her sisters, Dora and Eda, and declared, “They put […]

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Adele Springsteen, Bruce Springsteen’s Mother, Dies at 98

Adele Springsteen, who nurtured the budding musical talent of her son, the pioneering rock star Bruce Springsteen, died on Wednesday. She was 98. Mr. Springsteen announced his mother’s death in an Instagram post on Thursday. No cause was given, but Ms. Springsteen had struggled for more than a decade with Alzheimer’s disease. Her son has […]

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Madonna’s Celebration Tour Draws Fans Clad in Leather and Lace

Madonna performed at Madison Square Garden on Monday night as part of her Celebration Tour, a lavish stage spectacle devoted to her catalog of hits as the Queen of Pop. During “Like a Prayer,” she sang from a spinning carousel filled with jumbo crucifixes and shirtless men. When she performed “Vogue,” she invited Kelly Ripa […]

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Taylor Swift, SZA, Billie Eilish: Who Will Have a Big Grammys?

The 66th annual Grammy Awards on Sunday are poised to be a celebration of a dominant year for women in pop music, with female stars like SZA, Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodrigo and Billie Eilish facing off in the major categories. SZA, whose “SOS” was a critical and chart smash, leads with nine nominations; the pop […]

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Melinda Wilson, Wife of Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson, Dies at 77

Melinda Kay Ledbetter Wilson, who rescued her husband, the Beach Boys co-founder Brian Wilson, from psychological ruin, died on Tuesday. She was 77. Mr. Wilson confirmed her death on Instagram, saying that they had been married for 28 years and had five children together. Representatives for the family could not be reached for comment late […]

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Taylor Swift, Travis Kelce and a MAGA Meltdown

For football fans eager to see a new team in the Super Bowl, the conference championship games on Sunday that sent the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers back to the main event of American sports culture were sorely disappointing. But one thing is new: Taylor Swift. And she is driving the movement behind […]

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5 Places to Visit in Tucson, Arizona, With Singer Linda Ronstadt

In the course of becoming a Rock & Roll Hall of Famer, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winner and the subject of a forthcoming biopic set to star Selena Gomez, Linda Ronstadt has packed theaters around the globe. But her favorite sits on a one-way side street in Tucson, Ariz. With a courtyard draped in […]

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New Hope for Hostage Talks, and Trump Takes the Stand

The New York Times Audio app is home to journalism and storytelling, and provides news, depth and serendipity. If you haven’t already, download it here — available to Times news subscribers on iOS — and sign up for our weekly newsletter. The Headlines brings you the biggest stories of the day from the Times journalists […]

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How Did These Strange Songs Hit No. 1?

When Melanie’s “Brand New Key” debuted in 1971, some people were confused. What did the singer, who died on Tuesday at 76, mean when she sang about having a brand-new pair of roller skates and someone else having a brand-new key? Melanie told one interviewer that she wrote the song in 15 minutes, after ending […]

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Melanie, Singer Who Made a Solo Splash at Woodstock, Dies at 76

Melanie, the husky-voiced singer and songwriter who was one of the surprise stars of the Woodstock music festival in 1969 and two years later had a No. 1 single with the disarmingly childlike “Brand New Key,” died on Tuesday. She was 76. Her death was announced on social media by her children, Leilah, Jeordie and […]

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Sarah Jarosz Tests the Mainstream

In modern Nashville, songwriting is often a matter of professionalized co-writing: planned, mix-and-match collaborations by appointment, musicians sharing a room to come up with sturdy material. It’s a method that Sarah Jarosz had largely shied away from until she made her seventh studio album, “Polaroid Lovers.” The LP, arriving Friday, includes songs she wrote with […]

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Frank Farian, the Man Behind Milli Vanilli, Is Dead at 82

Frank Farian, the German record producer who was best known as the mastermind of Milli Vanilli, the duo that scaled the charts in 1989 but fell from grace when it was revealed that they didn’t do any of the singing on their records, died on Tuesday at his home in Miami. He was 82. His […]

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Mary Weiss, Who Sang ‘Leader of the Pack,’ Is Dead at 75

Mary Weiss, who was the lead singer of the Shangri-Las hit No. 1 in 1964 with “Leader of the Pack,” extracting every ounce of passion and pathos available in a three-minute adolescent soap opera, died on Friday at her home in Palm Springs, Calif. She was 75. Her death was announced by the author and […]

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Broadway Shows to See This Winter and Spring

A guide to the shows onstage now and scheduled to arrive this winter and spring, including “Cabaret,” “Hell’s Kitchen” and “The Outsiders.” What to See | Getting Tickets What to See And suddenly, Broadway is packed again. After an autumn that wasn’t exactly overwhelmed with openings, spring is looking absolutely jammed, with 19 productions currently […]

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Leon Wildes, Immigration Lawyer Who Defended John Lennon, Dies at 90

Leon Wildes, a New York immigration lawyer who successfully fought the United States government’s attempt to deport John Lennon, died on Monday in Manhattan. He was 90. His death, at Lenox Hill Hospital, was confirmed by his son Michael. For more than three years, from early 1972 to the fall of 1975, Mr. Wildes (pronounced […]

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Phantom Artists Stole Their Songs. They Couldn’t Get Them Back.

The guys in Bad Dog, a folkie duo from Washington, D.C., weren’t hoping to get rich off the album they recorded this summer. David Post and Craig Blackwell have been devoted amateurs for decades, and they’re long past dreams of tours and limos. Mostly they wanted a CD to give away at a house party […]

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A Sharp Warning About Donald Trump

To the Editor: Re “This Election Year Is Unlike Any Other” (editorial, Jan. 7): The editorial board deserves a monumental “thank you!” for spelling out in such detail how uniquely dangerous Donald Trump is. There was no misguided nod to both-sides-ism here. This was the full-throated condemnation of Donald Trump that the facts demand. The […]

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Sinead O’Connor Died of Natural Causes, Coroner Says

A London coroner’s office said Tuesday that the Irish singer Sinead O’Connor died from natural causes. Ms. O’Connor, 56, was found dead at a residential property in London in July. Shortly afterward, the local coroner announced they would conduct an autopsy of her body. In a brief statement on Tuesday, the coroner said that “Ms. […]

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How ‘Insomniac’ Became an a Cappella Sensation

In high school, I joined Rebel Yell, an a cappella group named after the Billy Idol song. I mostly beatboxed or sang background vocals. But one year, my chorus teacher gave me a lead vocal. It was on a song called “Insomniac,” by a folk rock duo called Billy Pilgrim. Our audiences didn’t know the […]

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