Solange Knowles is criticizing the Grammys over its lack of black Album of the Year winners after her sister, Beyoncé, lost out in that category to Adele at the Sunday, February 12, ceremony.
The “Losing You” singer, 30, shared the statistics for past Album of the Year winners in a since-deleted tweet. “There have only been two black winners in the last 20 years for album of the year there have been over 200 black artists who have performed,” she tweeted on Monday, February 13. In a second now-deleted tweet, she added, “Create your own committees, build your own institutions, give your friends awards, award yourself, and be the gold you wanna hold my g’s.”
The message comes hours after Solange subtly shaded the Grammys by supporting Frank Ocean’s scathing open letter about “cultural bias” at the awards show. “wuddup frank,” her now-deleted tweet read on Sunday along with a link to Ocean’s post. The R&B singer, who kept his acclaimed album Blonde out of consideration this year, also blasted the Recording Academy in the letter for giving Album of the Year to Taylor Swift’s 1989 over Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly last year, calling it “one of the most ‘faulty’ TV moments I’ve seen.”
Solange won a Grammy this year for Best R&B Performance for her track “Cranes in the Sky,” but the award wasn’t one of the televised categories. “Thank you for your well wishes. Gratitude. If I would’ve gotten to accept this, I would’ve said black girls/women ARE grammys mothaf—ka,” she also wrote on Sunday in a since-deleted tweet next to a photo of herself holding the Grammy.
As previously reported, many fans believed Beyoncé’s Lemonade was snubbed at the Grammys, only winning two awards out of nine nominations. Rihanna was also nominated for eight Grammys and won zero.
When Adele accepted her awards, she praised the “Formation” songstress in two of her speeches. While giving her Album of the Year acceptance speech, she said, “I’m very humbled and very grateful and gracious, but my artist of my life is Beyoncé. And this album for me, the Lemonade album, Beyoncé, was so monumental and so well thought out. And so beautiful and soul-baring, we all got to see another side of you that you don’t always let us see, and we appreciate that.” Beyoncé was seen tearing up and mouthing “thank you” in the audience.
