When Angélique Kidjo won the Grammy for Best World Music Album in January 2020, she spent part of her acceptance speech talking about the man she had beaten. She named Burna Boy and told the room he was one of a new generation of African artists taking over.
Fourteen months later, on 14 March 2021, Burna Boy won the award himself. His album Twice as Tall took Best Global Music Album at the 63rd Grammy Awards, the first year the category carried that name.
African Giant
Burna Boy’s first nomination came for African Giant, released in July 2019. The album carried “Anybody”, “Killin Dem” and “On the Low”, and it arrived after a run in which Burna had become one of the most talked-about acts in African music. He had also been working towards the American market; he appeared on Beyoncé’s The Lion King: The Gift soundtrack that year with “Ja Ara E”.
African Giant lost to Kidjo’s Celia, her tribute to the Cuban singer Celia Cruz. Kidjo’s speech made the loss feel like a handover rather than a defeat.
Twice as Tall
Burna released Twice as Tall in August 2020, in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was executive produced by Sean “Diddy” Combs together with Burna’s mother, Bose Ogulu, who is also his manager. The album featured Chris Martin of Coldplay on “Monsters You Made”, Youssou N’Dour on “Level Up (Twice as Tall)”, and Naughty by Nature and Stormzy on other tracks.
“Monsters You Made” was one of the most political songs of his career, addressing colonialism, corruption and police violence in Nigeria. The album’s release was followed within weeks by the #EndSARS protests against police brutality, which gave the song new weight.
The night of the win
The 2021 ceremony was held under pandemic restrictions, and the Global Music Album award was presented before the main televised show. His win was celebrated across Nigeria as the moment Afrobeats arrived at the top table of the music business.
Wizkid won his first Grammy on the same day, for his feature on Beyoncé’s “Brown Skin Girl”, which took Best Music Video. Two of Nigeria’s biggest stars won Grammys on the same afternoon.
What followed
The win changed the scale of Burna’s career. Love, Damini in 2022 produced “Last Last”, a global hit, and he went on to sell out stadiums in London and the United States. His 2023 show at the London Stadium was billed as the first by an African artist to sell out a UK stadium.
Kidjo’s line in 2020 was that the new generation of African artists was coming. The next year, one of the people she named took home the trophy she had just won.
