kmfm Female acts have dominated this year s Brit Awards, with Little Mix and Dua Lipa among the big winners and Taylor Swift making a surprise appearance - at a ceremony which saw artists calling out sexism and a lack of diversity in the music industry.
Many winners at the show - the UK s first major indoor live music event in more than a year, held without masks and social distancing as part of a
COVID-19 test scheme - also paid tribute to key workers in their acceptance speeches, with
Lipa calling on Boris Johnson to improve pay.
For
Little Mix, the night was history making, as they became the first female band in 41 years of the
BBC News
By Mark Savage
image captionTaylor Swift picked up the global icon award in recognition of her seven number one albums Everybody get up out of the seats! shouts Chris, the warm-up man at The Brits, as he cues up Rihanna s We Found Love and encourages everyone to dance.
We don t need asking twice. For the 4,000-strong audience, this is the first chance we ve had to see live music in more than a year.
As it s a pilot event for the post-Covid era, masks have been removed and drinks have been drunk. The air is feverish with anticipation but no-one s anticipating a fever: we ve all had negative Covid tests.
The Brit Awards featured an audience of 4,000 people and took place as part of the Government’s live events pilot scheme. Some 2,500 tickets were gifted to key workers from the Greater London area, many of whom wore blue.
During her acceptance speech as she picked up the female solo artist gong, Lipa said: “It’s very good to clap for them, but we need to pay them.
“I think what we should do is we should all give a massive, massive round of applause and give Boris (Johnson) a message that we all support a fair pay rise for our front line.”
The Brit Awards featured an audience of 4,000 people and took place as part of the Government’s live events pilot scheme. Some 2,500 tickets were gifted to key workers from the Greater London area, many of whom wore blue.
During her acceptance speech as she picked up the female solo artist gong, Lipa said: “It’s very good to clap for them, but we need to pay them.
“I think what we should do is we should all give a massive, massive round of applause and give Boris (Johnson) a message that we all support a fair pay rise for our front line.”
Cabinet minister George Eustice stressed there is a “difficult public finance environment” after Dua Lipa used her Brit Awards acceptance speech to call for an NHS pay rise.
Lipa was the big winner at the female-dominated Brit Awards, which marked the return of live music to the O2 Arena after more than a year.
She won both best female solo artist and the coveted best album award, using her first speech to call for a pay rise for NHS workers and her second to demand a posthumous bravery award for 20-year-old Folajimi Olubunmi-Adewole, who recently died after jumping into the River Thames to save a woman.