Miley Cyrus Omits Dad Billy Ray from Grammys Acceptance Speech for Record of the Year

Billie Eilish, boygenius, Jon Batiste, Olivia Rodrigo, SZA, Taylor Swift and Victoria Monét were also in the running for this year's big prize

Miley Cyrus is officially a two-time Grammy winner — and "Flowers" is officially the record of the year.

Cyrus, 31, took the stage to accept the award for her 2023 hit and made an effort to thank "all the people that we love," and included a sweet shoutout to viewers watching at home.

"This award is amazing. But I really hope that it doesn't change anything because my life was beautiful yesterday. Not everyone in the world will get a Grammy, but everyone in this world is spectacular," she said, before adding with a laugh, "So please don't think that this is important, even though it's very important, right guys?"

US singer-songwriter Miley Cyrus accepts the Record Of The Year award for "Flowers" on stage during the 66th Annual Grammy Awards at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on February 4, 2024.

VALERIE MACON/AFP via Getty Images

Cyrus went on to thank "everyone that's standing on this stage right now Tom, Tyler, Michael and Greg. Our teams, my team, Crush, Columbia, my mommy, my sister, my love, my main gays because look how good I look."

She then asked the team behind her, "Anyone else? Your wife, your fiancée, all the people that we love. Thank you all so much."

"I don't think I forgot anyone. But I might have forgotten underwear. Bye!" she quipped as she concluded her speech, which did not mention her dad, Billy Ray Cyrus.

"Flowers" beat out Billie Eilish's "What Was I Made For?," boygenius' "Not Strong Enough," Jon Batiste's "Worship," Olivia Rodrigo's "vampire," SZA's "Kill Bill, Taylor Swift's "Anti-Hero" and Victoria Monét's "On My Mama" to take home the major award, which honors the overall production of a song.

Billie Eilish (R) and US singer-songwriter Finneas O'Connell accept the Song Of The Year award for "What Was I Made For?" on stage during the 66th Annual Grammy Awards at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on February 4, 2024.
Billie Eilish and Finneas O'Connell accept the Song Of The Year award for "What Was I Made For?" on stage during the 66th Annual Grammy Awards at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on February 4, 2024.

VALERIE MACON/AFP via Getty Images

Eilish, 22, and her brother/collaborator Finneas O'Connell's gentle ballad "What Was I Made For?" (produced by them, Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt) hails from the Barbie movie and plays in a pivotal scene in the film, during which Margot Robbie's titular character comes to accept her identity. Beyond being a central component to the Greta Gerwig-directed blockbuster, the song's tender lyrics have connected with fans since its July 2023 release.

The pop star has opened up about how personal the song has become to her in the past, as it helped her emerge from a period of self-doubt. She told Apple Music's Zane Lowe in an interview, "Honestly, [Finneas and I] were in a period of time where we were both ... like through this last winter, we've both been incredibly uninspired. And we've still been working and trying to make stuff. And honestly, that song was the first thing we'd written in a minute." 

After explaining that she didn't realize how much the song's lyric's reflected her own experience, she added, "I was like, 'This is exactly how I feel. And I didn't even mean to be saying it.'"

"What Was I Made For?" was also nominated for best pop solo performance, best song written for visual media and best music video, and was awarded best song earlier in the night.

As the song appears on the Barbie soundtrack, it has been up for a handful of awards this season — previously winning best original song at the 2024 Golden Globes. It is also currently up for best original song at the 2024 Academy Awards.

Julien Baker, Lucy Dacus, and Phoebe Bridgers of boygenius arrive at The 66th Annual Grammy Awards, airing live from Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, California, Sunday, Feb. 4
Julien Baker, Lucy Dacus, and Phoebe Bridgers of boygenius arrive at The 66th Annual Grammy Awards, airing live from Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, California, Sunday, Feb. 4.

Francis Specker/CBS via Getty 

The indie supergroup boygenius featuring Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus received their first-ever Grammy nominations this year. Among other nominations, the song "Not Strong Enough" from their debut full-length LP the record earned record of the year, best rock performance and best rock song nods. The song was co-produced by the trio, Catherine Marks, Ethan Gruska, Melina Duterte, Sarah Tudzin and Tony Berg.

The driving indie-rock/alternative-folk song, which has become a fan-favorite, sees the three vocalists introspectively exploring the challenge it can be to show up for someone else when they may not be mentally capable.

In a Rolling Stone interview, Bridgers, 29, spoke candidly about the themes behind the lyrics. She explained it as "being like, ‘I’m not strong enough to show up for you. I can’t be the partner that you want me to be.’ But also being like, ‘I’m too f----- up. I’m unknowable in some deep way!’"

The indie rock star continued, "Self-hatred is a god complex sometimes, where you think you’re the most f------up person who’s ever lived. Straight up, you’re not. And it can make people behave really selfishly, and I love each of our interpretations of that concept."

boygenius' album the record was also nominated for both album of the year and best alternative album, and their song "Cool About It" received a nomination for best alternative music performance.

Jon Batiste and Ann Nesby performs onstage during the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.
Jon Batiste and Ann Nesby performs onstage during the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.

Amy Sussman/Getty Images

While Batiste's "Butterfly" is nominated for song of the year and best American roots performance, the World Music Radio track "Worship" is up for record of the year.

The song (featuring production from Batiste, Jon Bellion, Pete Nappi and TenRoc) fuses jazz, gospel, roots and hip-hop sounds into a joyous celebration about the beauty of connection within the human experience.

In the description of the musician's seventh studio album on Apple Music, he shared that the inspiration behind "Worship" came from wanting to sonically capture an "appreciation of your own humanity and the collective of humanity."

Batiste, 37, explained, "When you hear these lyrics over and over again as the chords swell, and the synthesizers are crafted in this way that feels like samba-slash-Swedish House Mafia, something about both of those sounds together is catharsis. It creates a release in people when you’re collected in a community, whether it’s at a festival or at a game at a stadium."

Miley Cyrus performs onstage during the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.
Miley Cyrus performs onstage during the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

One of the biggest songs of the past year came from Cyrus, 31, as fans couldn't get enough of her ultra-catchy, self-love anthem "Flowers." Not only did it break records upon its release — becoming the first song to reach over 100 million streams on Spotify in one week — it hit the milestone of earning one trillion streams after just three months and sat pretty atop the Billboard Hot 100 for eight weeks.

The pop star has opened up about how much it means to her that listeners have embraced the Kid Harpoon and Tyler Johnson co-produced track off her album Endless Summer Vacation. As the commemorated the one-year anniversary of the song's release, she wrote, "One year ago today ‘Flowers’ started making people happy & that makes me happy," in the caption of a sweet post on Instagram.

Cyrus also told British Vogue that the disco-pop tune was originally much different, with the message being, "Sure, I can be my own lover, but you’re so much better," but she's come to be proud of the lyrical evolution. She said, "The song is a little fake it till you make it. Which I’m a big fan of.”

The singer earned her first Grammy award to kick off the televised awards show as she won best pop solo performance for "Flowers" and celebrated the win alongside one of her own icons, Mariah Carey, who presented the award to her.

"This MC is gonna stand by this MC," Cyrus said before calling it "iconic" to be accepting the award from Carey, 54.

Olivia Rodrigo 66th Annual Grammy Awards, Arrivals, Fashion Highlights, Los Angeles, USA - 04 Feb 2024
Olivia Rodrigo arrives at the 66th Annual Grammy Awards.

 David Fisher/Shutterstock

Rodrigo, 20, launched the release of her hit sophomore album GUTS by dropping "vampire" in summer 2023. The searing power ballad finds the pop-rock star reflecting on how an ex took advantage of and used her throughout their relationship.

As the track reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 upon its release, the star became the first-ever artist to debut the lead singles of both their debut and sophomore album at the top of the chart.

Rodrigo has previously said that the emotional song came to her in a moment of frustration. "I was upset about a certain situation and went to the studio alone and sat down at the grand piano, and the chords and melody and lyrics just poured out of me — almost like an out-of-body experience," she told DORK.

She continued, "It’s a song about feeling confused and hurt, and at first I thought it was meant to be a piano ballad. But when [producer Dan Nigro] and I started working on it, we juxtaposed the lyrics with these big drums and crazy tempo changes. So now it’s like a heartbreak song you can dance to.”

"vampire" also earned nods for song of the year and best pop solo performance.

SZA performs onstage at the 66th Annual GRAMMY Awards held at Crypto.com Arena on February 4, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.
SZA performs onstage during the 66th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 04, 2024 in Los Angeles, California.

Kevin Winter/Getty Images

SZA's "Kill Bill" is one of her biggest songs to date, as it spent weeks in the Top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100 and ended up shattering records on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. The track off 2022's SOS has been acclaimed for both its groovy rhythm and confessional lyrics, which find the R&B superstar, 34, fantasizing about murdering an ex.

While the song (produced by Rob Bisel and Carter Lang) has been a huge success, the singer-songwriter shared with Variety in a November 2023 interview that she was once hesitant to release it because of its subject matter.

Those hesitations quickly became feelings of the past when she realized the extent to which fans embraced the song — expressing her gratitude on X (formerly Twitter) when the song reached No. 1 on the Hot 100 by writing, "took me a over week to process cause I dreamt of this my entire career."

SZA is the most-nominated artist at this year's Grammys, in part thanks to the amount of recognition "Kill Bill" has received. The song was also up for record of the year and best R&B performance.

Lana Del Rey and Taylor Swift behind the scenes at The 66th Annual Grammy Awards, airing live from Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, California, Sunday, Feb. 4
Lana Del Rey and Taylor Swift behind the scenes at The 66th Annual Grammy Awards, airing live from Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, California, Sunday, Feb. 4.

Francis Specker/CBS

Swift, 34, and her frequent collaborator Jack Antonoff's team-up "Anti Hero" received record of the year, song of the year and best pop solo performance nomations. The synth-pop tune, which finds the superstar examining her own flaws and public's perception of her, was the lead single off her hit 2022 album Midnights.

The singer-songwriter previously called the vulnerable track "one of my favorite songs I’ve ever written." In a video posted to Instagram prior to its release, she said, “I like ‘Anti-Hero’ a lot because I think it’s really honest.”

"I really don’t think I’ve delved this far into my insecurities in this detail before," the superstar added. “It’s all of those aspects of the things we dislike and like about ourselves that we have to come to terms with if we’re going to be this person."

"Anti-Hero" eventually became a record-breaking release for the pop star. After topping the Billboard Hot 100 for eight consecutive weeks, it became her longest running No. 1 of all time in early 2023.

Hazel Monet Gaines (L), John Gaines (C) and US singer-songwriter Victoria Monet (R) arrive for the 66th Annual Grammy Awards at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on February 4, 2024
Victoria Monét, John Gaines and their daughter Hazel arrive for the 66th Annual Grammy Awards at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on February 4, 2024.

ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty

Monét's "On My Mama" (produced by D'Mile, Jeff Gitelman and Deputy) is among several of her songs up for awards at the 2024 Grammys, with both a record of the year and best R&B song nods. The hip-hop-influenced R&B song, which touts the star's self-confidence, has become the fan-beloved, breakout center piece of her debut studio album Jaguar II, which dropped in August of last year.

It earned the singer-songwriter her first entry into the Hot 100, where it entered the Top 40.

Monét opened up to PEOPLE about her first full-length album on RCA ahead of its release. "I feel like the project rounds up how women and people feel in general,” she said. “We can embody more than one emotion and be more than one type of person. You don't have to be so stereotypically one thing.”

The rising R&B superstar — who won best new artist earlier in the night — also spoke about being grateful for her ascension after years of working as a songwriter, thanks in part to the success of "On My Mama." She said, “There's been a lot of talk on Twitter that I'm underrated, and I really always appreciate that because I feel like it means that people see more for me than I currently have, which is always good. I'd always rather be underrated than overrated. I feel like there's so much more to be said, shown and seen.”

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