Kim Petras and Sam Smith are the first transgender and nonbinary Grammy Award winners for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, respectively. The award was given to the duo for their hit single “Unholy,” which they also performed at the awards ceremony.
“Sam graciously wanted me to accept this award because I am the first transgender woman to win this award,” Petras said during the duo’s acceptance speech, which was met with rousing applause from the audience.
Smith is the award’s first nonbinary winner.
“Unholy” topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart late last year and spent four weeks atop the Billboard Global 200 chart in 2022. According to Billboard, it was both artists’ first number-one hit, and Smith and Petras were the first publicly nonbinary and transgender artists to top the Hot 100.
“I want to thank all the incredible transgender legends who opened these doors for me so I could be here tonight,” Petras continued, mentioning her friend Sophie, a fellow musical artist and trans woman who died in 2021 after an accidental fall.
Sophie’s first and only studio album, “Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides,” was nominated for a Grammy in 2019 for Best Dance/Electronic Album.
“I’m grateful for your inspiration, Sophie,” Petras said. “I adore you, and your influence will live on in my music forever.”
Petras went on to thank Madonna, saying that “I don’t think I could be here” without her.
“I grew up next to a highway in nowhere Germany, and my mother believed me that I was a girl,” she added.
“I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for her and her support,” she said.
Petras is the second transgender woman to win a Grammy, following Wendy Carlos, a synth and electronic music pioneer. Carlos has received six Grammy nominations and three awards, including Best Classical Album of the Year at the 12th Grammy Awards. She is best known for her work on Stanley Kubrick’s cult classic “A Clockwork Orange” (1971).
