Grammy Highs and Lows: Annie Lennox, Sam Smith Take America to Church; Madonna Doesn't

Have there ever been as many orchestras and choirs in one place as at this year’s Grammys? You half-expected to find Madonna’s red-robed, vaguely satanic-looking chorale rumbling with Sam Smith’s choir in the alley behind Staples Center after the show. Fortunately, some of the performers really did take us to church. Among the 2015 telecast’s best and weakest moments:

HIGH: Hozier and Annie LennoxYou could see this coming as a highlight from a mile away, but even then, their medley exceeded expectations. Lennox has just the “churchy” voice to drive Hozier’s hit home on the chorus, but subsequently seemed anything but angelic as she belted out Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’s classic “I Put a Spell on You” with a demonic look in her eyes we haven’t seen since the earliest days of Eurythmics. 

LOW: MadonnaAt the moment when she could most use a turnaround, Madonna, who showed up on the red carpet in a racy, butt-barring ensemble, inexplicably turned in the most passive TV performance of her career. She took the “Lift me up” chorus of her new single “Living for Love” all too literally, as a coterie of dancers tossed her from person to person. It was less reminiscent of the woman-handling “Material Girl” video than of medics gingerly handling someone fresh out of surgery — even though Madonna’s thigh muscles looked as powerful as ever. It was impressive, at least, that she managed to find that many of Maleficent’s nephews to join her backup dancing crew, and that they managed not to impale her.

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HIGH: Kristen Wiig, Maddie Ziegler, and (we think) SiaLess a musical performance than performance art, this gonzo dance/mime version of  “Chandelier” by the ex-SNL comedian and the Dance Moms star — and maybe even Sia somewhere in there, too — made America do a collective spit-take. Whether you thought it was hysterical or ridiculously highfalutin’, it was just the wakeup call viewers needed after three hours of increasing drowsiness.

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