The Grammys booked the right trio to honor Aretha Franklin, who died in August at 76. Gospel singer Yolanda Adams and Fantasia, who both performed at Franklin’s funeral, as well as Andra Day, did the Queen of Soul justice with their take on “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman.” The song came seamlessly after the regular In Memoriam montage, with the three singers standing in the middle of the audience on a small stage. They definitely brought the goods, belting out the lyrics and taking us all to church. But it was too short; has everyone tired of Franklin tributes already? If only the Grammy telecast had blocked off more time for a Franklin send-off — surely Diana Ross could have spared a couple of her minutes.<doc-sep>UPDATED, 1:21 PM: The final numbers for the 61st annual Grammy Awards are in, and they include an all-time demo low for music’s biggest night. The live CBS show drew a 5.6 rating in the adult 18-49 demographic. That’s down just over 5% from last year’s previous demo low. As for viewership, Sunday’s Grammys is pretty much even with last year’s show, pulling in 19.9 million total viewers, compared with 2018’s 19.8 million. So as Led Zeppelin might sing, the song somewhat remained the same in sets of eyeballs. PREVIOUSLY, 6:09 AM: Michelle Obama kicked things off last night at the 61st Grammy Awards after some “Havana” sizzle, then Lady Gaga continued her Taylor Swift-shocked victory look tour and Ariana Grande won but very clearly wasn’t in the house. Additionally, during the nearly four-hour CBS show, Drake showed up in a rare award-show appearance but got cut off, K-Pop superstars BTS made some history, Jennifer Lopez took center stage for a Motown tribute with Smokey Robinson, and Diana Ross slayed, as she supremely does. Back in Los Angeles after last year’s stint in New York City, this year’s Alicia Keys-hosted ceremony also saw a Dolly Parton tribute plus a Prince-tinged and seemingly Klaus Nomi-inspired showstopper by Janelle Monáe. Back on in February after last year’s January airing, last night’s Grammys handed out some hardware too. There were some big wins by Cardi B, A Star Is Born Gaga, Kasey Musgraves and Childish Gambino aka Atlanta creator Donald Glover too, plus that ’70s rocker-in-chief Jimmy Carter snagged his third Grammy and Spotify got mentioned a lot. However, when it comes to the ratings, the song pretty much stayed the same. Last night’s primetime show snagged a 12.8/22 in metered market ratings. Facing the competition of the midseason return of The Walking Dead on cable, the 2019 Grammys bucked the recent awards-show ratings trend to increase a tiny bit from last year’s James Corden-hosted bash. (By “a tiny bit,” I mean less than 1% in the metered markets over the 60th annual Grammy Awards, but up is up – at least for now, in the early metrics.) The January 28, 2018 show, which saw a cameo by Hillary Clinton and more than its fair share of Donald Trump cage-rattling, went on to score a 5.9/21 rating among adults 18-49 and 19.81 million viewers, that metric the worst that the CBS-aired show had seen since 2009, when the telecast snared an audience of 19.04 million viewers. Though they didn’t go head to head with a returning TWD, the 2018 Grammys were also the lowest rated ever among the valued 18-49 demographic. We’ll update with more numbers from the Kacey Musgraves- and Childish Gambino-led Grammys plus the rest of the Big 4 night later on. A night that saw Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them making its network debut on NBC, I might counter-programmingly add. And yes, the mentioned country singer and the multi-medium Glover were the top winners of the night with four Grammys each. UPDATE, 8:45 AM: They are still sweeping up on many levels from last night’s Grammy Awards at LA’s Staples Center and the final ratings numbers haven’t been sung yet, but music’s biggest night is not looking so big. In fast affiliate results, the CBS-broadcasted 61st annual Grammy Awards has hit the sour notes of a 5.0/19 rating among adults 18-49 and 17.95 million viewers. Now, that’s all likely to be adjusted in the final numbers but right now the Alicia Keys fronted three-hour plus running ceremony is down almost 8% in the key demo from the fast affiliates of last year’s record low James Corden host Grammys. It’s a bit of a flip move when you look at the total audience in this early round of ratings. The 17.95 million that watched last night the awards shows is up 1.7% from the viewership that the 60th annual Grammys had in the fast affiliates last year. Back in February and the City of Angels after a move to January and NYC in 2018, this year’s Grammys was up against the just over one-hour Season 9 midseason premiere of AMC’s The Walking Dead – which could have taken a bite out of those demo numbers. Right now, it looks like last night’s Grammys are on the way to being the lowest rated ever as they fall beneath last year’s demo action. Then again, with very little serious competition among the Big 4, CBS easily won the primetime battle with a 4.4/17 rating and 16.02 million watching. The only other originals on the broadcast nets were Fox’s animation offerings of The Simpsons (0.7/3), Bob’s Burgers (0.7.3) and Family Guy (0.8/3). All three dropped to season lows in the 18-49. NBC had Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (0.5/2), which did OK for the Comcast-owned net for a Sunday movie, all things considered.<doc-sep>Associated Press Nearly 20 million people watched Childish Gambino and Kacey Musgraves earn four trophies each at the Grammy Awards, about the same audience as the annual music show had last year. The Nielsen company on Monday estimated the Grammy audience size at 19.9 million. The 2018 audience of 19.8 million had been the Grammys' smallest audience in a decade. Who won? Grammy Awards 2019: The winners list What you need to know:Brutally honest reviews and rankings of every Grammys 2019 performance All the pics:Grammys 2019: Photos from the red carpet Alicia Keys hosted the awards show, which last nearly four hours. The night had some strong performances, particularly by women. Cardi B, Brandi Carlile, Janelle Monae and Musgraves all had memorable turns onstage, with Dolly Parton and Diana Ross participating in their own crowd-pleasing tributes. Still, the night had its share of bad vibes. Childish Gambino and Kendrick Lamar declined invitations to attend, and Ariana Grande pulled out following a dispute with producers. The Grammys also cut short the acceptance speeches of several Grammy winners, including Drake and Musgraves. The Grammys at least stopped the steep audience erosion evident last year. The 2017 telecast was seen by 26.1 million people, with the show generally getting an audience of between 20 and 30 million the last decade. CBS said that according to the media analytics firm Netbase, the Grammys drove more social media conversation than any awards show over the past two years.<doc-sep>
With America’s dwindling attention span — not to mention appetite — for televised awards shows, Sunday night’s 2019 Grammy Awards, hosted by a radiant Alicia Keys, did not embarrass itself. Nor did the broadcast from LA’s Staples Center distinguish itself. Advertised tributes to Motown diva Diana Ross and country icon Dolly Parton resonated with audiences, if social media is any indicator. But did the tireless hype machine surrounding Lady Gaga’s every move deliver extra eyeballs to the CBS broadcast? Numbers are in: the overall show, which ran long, scored 19.9 million viewers — up slightly from last year’s 19.8 million viewers, according to Nielsen time-zone-adjusted fast national ratings. Last year’s show, hosted by James Corden, came perilously close to the lowest rating CBS has ever received for a Grammys telecast — 19.04 million viewers in 2009. Bonus points: the 2019 telecast did win the night in key demos (6.7 in adults 25-54 and 5.6 in adults 18-49), the largest primetime audience and best demo deliveries for any non-sports/non-Super Bowl Sunday programming in the 2018-2019 season, CBS says. Meanwhile, country singer Kacey Musgraves won four awards, including Album of the Year. Donald Glover alter ego Childish Gambino won four as well. Lady Gaga and Seattle-born singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile won three apiece. But the night’s most buzzed-about moment came early on, when former first lady Michelle Obama showed up on stage with Keys, Gaga, Jada Pinkett Smith and Jennifer Lopez for a segment about the power of music. We need Michelle Obama to tell us that music can help inspire self-empowerment now? It was superfluous and politically motivated.