I missed this last month. I didn't hear about this award at all. And it's funny that I've found about it in this particular moment.
I listen to LEMONADE for the poetry in the car when I'm on my way to work. Even though I like the music well-enough and adore the one Beyonce sings about her relationship with her father (as opposed to her mother's husband), just the other day I was thinking it should have been put up for awards as a spoken word album instead of music album or even as a visual music album.
I listen to LEMONADE for the poetry in the car when I'm on my way to work. Even though I like the music well-enough and adore the one Beyonce sings about her relationship with her father (as opposed to her mother's husband), just the other day I was thinking it should have been put up for awards as a spoken word album instead of music album or even as a visual music album.
Now I've found out, a month late, that somebody else kinda thought the same thing. LEMONADE won a Peabody Award.
The Peabody Awards announced their 2017 honorees on Thursday, and Beyoncé's Lemonade visual album has been recognized by the committee for its contributions to American culture.
“Lemonade draws from the prolific literary, musical, cinematic, and aesthetic sensibilities of black cultural producers to create a rich tapestry of poetic innovation,” the committee wrote in the announcement on Thursday. “The audacity of its reach and fierceness of its vision challenges our cultural imagination, while crafting a stunning and sublime masterpiece about the lives of women of color and the bonds of friendship seldom seen or heard in American popular culture.”
http://www.thefader.com/2017/04/20/beyonce-lemonade-peabody-award-donald-glover-atlanta
I was a fan of Poet Warsan Shire long before Beyonce's Lemonade came out. So I bought the visual album immediately. Even though I haven't seen the video portion in a while, the words of LEMONADE always make me think.
Or maybe I should say Warsan Shire always makes me feel and think. Or maybe, in this case, it's both Warsan and Beyonce together that make me feel and think about my place in this world as a black woman. It's hard to tell when the poetry of Warsan ends and the poetry of Beyonce begins sometimes.
That's part of what's wonderful about it.
I highly suggest giving LEMONADE a listen while you're driving or cooking or cleaning or exercising or just hanging out --maybe see what it echoes back to you about your own life.
Maybe you'll decide to make a change.
I highly suggest giving LEMONADE a listen while you're driving or cooking or cleaning or exercising or just hanging out --maybe see what it echoes back to you about your own life.
Maybe you'll decide to make a change.
There are some aspects of forgiveness where I think it leads black women down the garden path to nowhere. But even that "disagreement" I have with one of the messages is part of its being complicated. And its being complicated is a large part of its beauty.
Art is supposed have an impact. And LEMONADE lands most of its punches where it should.
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