Icon and star Blue Ivy Carter wins first Grammy Award, aged 9
Blue Ivy Carter is music’s rising supreme. (Getty/Parkwood)
Blue Ivy Carter has won her first Grammy Award at the age of nine years old.
Beyoncé wasn’t the only Carter making history at the 2021 Grammys, with her daughter Blue Ivy also winning her very own trophy.
Both mother and daughter won Best Music Video for “Brown Skin Girl”, taken from Beyoncé’s The Lion King: The Gift album and Black is King film.
Blue Ivy is credited on the track, singing on its chorus, and steals the show in its debutante-themed music video – which is saying something, considering the clip also includes appearances from Naomi Campbell, Lupita Nyong’o and Kelly Rowland.
It makes Blue Ivy the second youngest Grammy winner in history. Only Leah Peasall, of the country harmony group The Peasall Sisters, won at a younger age. She was just eight when her group won as part of the O Brother, Where Art Thou soundtrack ensemble.
Though she wasn’t at the ceremony, Beyoncé gave her daughter a shout-out while accepting an award of her own.
“I know my daughter is watching, two daughters and my son, y’all are all watching. Congratulations Blue. She won a Grammy tonight. I’m so proud of you, and I’m so honored to be your mommy, all of your mommys. Y’all are my babies. And I’m so proud of y’all.”
Blue Ivy Carter’s mother also made Grammy history
“Brown Skin Girl” became Blue Ivy Carter’s first Billboard 100 hit when it was released in 2019.
However, it was far from her first chart success. That came at the tender age of two weeks old, when she made her debut appearance on the Billboard R&B/Hip-Hop Songs with a feature on her dad Jay-Z’s “Glory”, credited as BIC.
Jay sampled Blue’s crying and cooing moments after her birth. She’d later appear on his acclaimed album 4:44, aged 5, performing a fully-fledged rap.
Also during Sunday night’s Grammys, Beyoncé made history with her 28th win. She is now the most-awarded woman in Grammys history, and matched Quincy Jones’ record for most-awarded artist alive. Only the late classical conductor Sir Georg Solti has more Grammys with 31, a record Beyoncé seems certain to best in years to come.
The award that tipped her into history was for her Juneteenth single “Black Parade”, which celebrates Black pride, power and history.
“As an artist, I believe it’s my job to reflect the times, and it’s been such a difficult time,” Beyoncé said, accepting the Best R&B Performance Award.
“So I wanted to uplift, encourage, celebrate all of the beautiful Black queens and kings that continue to inspire me and inspire the world.”
Earlier in the night she had been part of another first – as her “Savage Remix” helped Megan Thee Stallion become the first woman to win Best Rap Song. The collab also won Best Rap Performance. It’s been noted that of Beyoncé’s vast Grammy haul, only once has she won in one of the big four categories (“Single Ladies” for Song of the Year in 2009), prompting discussion of the way the award show undervalues Black art.
Other big winners included Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande – who became the first all-female pair to win Best Pop Duo Performance for “Rain on Me”, and Taylor Swift, who became the first woman and the fourth artist to win Album of the Year three times, taking home the award for Folklore.
