 "Beyonce’s ‘Cowboy Carter’ is a Grammy winner. But country music fans are fuming. Here’s why")
Is there anything that ‘Queen Bey’ Beyonce can’t do? She makes albums that are loved by all and wins Grammy after Grammy — she now has a haul of 35 golden gramophones. But not all of it is without controversy.
On February 2, Beyonce’s win for Best Country Album at the 2025 Grammy Awards raised eyebrows, earning a lot of wrath from country music fans.
Here’s what happened and why her historic win — she’s the first Black woman artist to win a country music category in half a century — has resulted in a controversy.
Beyonce’s big night at the Grammys
The 2025 Grammys were all about Beyonce. After receiving a whopping 11 nominations for her country music album Cowboy Carter — she now holds the record for maximum nominations of 99 — she finished the night at the Crypto.com Arena in downtown Los Angeles with three wins in categories such as the prestigious Best Album and Best Country Album.
Her winning streak began when Taylor Swift — an artist who successfully switched genres — appeared on stage to present the winner in the Best Country Album category. Beyonce’s Cowboy Carter was up against renowned country artists — Chris Stapleton, Lainey Wilson, and Kacey Musgraves.
Once Swift announced that Beyoncé was this year’s winner, Queen Bey’s whole body jolted as she reacted to her win.
The Texas Hold’ em singer paused a moment before standing up and exchanging hugs with her husband, Jay-Z, and daughter, Blue Ivy. She then made her way to the stage, where she verbalised her surprise at the win.
I'm screaming at Beyoncé's reaction to winning the Grammy for Best Country Album. queen!!!!! pic.twitter.com/BArMrfQG4q
— Spencer Althouse (@SpencerAlthouse) February 3, 2025
“Wow, I really was not expecting this. Wow,” she said. “I want to thank God — oh my god — that I’m able to still do what I love after so many years.”
She also directly addressed her shift into the country music space on Cowboy Carter, a move that not all country fans have championed.
“I think sometimes genre is a code word to keep us in our place as artists,” she said. “And I just want to encourage people to do what they’re passionate about, and to stay persistent.”
Beyoncé continued her remarks by thanking her “beautiful family” and collaborators before again addressing her surprise. “I still am in shock,” she said. “So thank you so much for this honour.”
She later also won the Best Album of the Year for Cowboy Carter, a category she has missed out on for four times.
Outrage against Beyonce’s win
But while Beyonce’s win in the Country category earned her whoops and applause, there was a certain section of fans — namely puritan country music fans — who questioned Queen Bey’s triumph at the Grammys.
Some took to X to vent their frustration on Beyonce’s Cowboy Carter album and her victory at the Grammy’s. One X user wrote, “Best Country Album goes to Beyonce’s ‘Cowboy Carter’. A total disgrace to country music. Yes she has country roots, but that album isn’t country. (Post Malone) actually made a real country album plus worthy albums from (Chris Stapleton) and (Lainey Wilson). Shame on the Academy!”
Another wrote, “Beyoncé did not deserve country album of the year get real, that record was a**,” while another alleged that the win “completely diminishes actual country artists.”
Others also vented; one user said on X: “Beyoncé winning Country Album of the Year? What a f***ing joke omg I’m sick of everything being rigged. Justice for the real country singers this Grammy should’ve gone to Miss Lainey f***in WILSON!!!!!”
Some even alluded that fellow nominee Kacey Musgraves was upset about Beyonce’s win, commenting on Musgraves’ expressions at the announcement.
Cowboy Carter — not country enough
For many, the criticism about Beyonce’s win is about her country roots and if her album, Cowboy Carter, is actually country enough. The album released last March has set off a firestorm of controversy.
Beyonce herself is from Houston, Texas where country music is the predominant genre of music.
When released, one country radio station refused to play it, saying it wasn’t authentic enough. It later added her tracks after receiving a huge online backlash. And then in September 2024, Cowboy Carter was completely spurned at the Country Music Awards despite topping the country chart and spending 22 weeks on the Billboard top 200 album ranking.
At the time, many experts provided reasons why Beyonce’s album was overlooked. Amanda Marie Martinez, a postdoctoral fellow in the department of American studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told NBC News, “There’s a real culture of deference where you’re supposed to bow down to the gatekeepers and fall in their good graces.” However, Martinez pointed out that Beyonce did nothing of the sort.
Radio personality Bobby Bones also questioned those who spoke about Beyonce’s music not being country enough. He wrote on X, “So let’s get historical. Country music is based on the music from Africa brought over on the slave ships. And from Europe. With the fiddle and banjo. So all these dudes yelling ‘that ain’t country’… unless you’re European or African, you ain’t really ‘country.’ As far as music goes.”
Experts also argued that the problem with Beyonce and her album is that for far too long, country music has been considered a genre made by and for white people. But data and history say otherwise. John Dyck of Auburn University, in a Forbes report, suggests that the idea of country music being an exclusive expression of white conventions was simply a marketing vehicle to fashion the genre for a more compelling appeal among white Americans. This construction has effectively excluded Black artists from the genre and instituted an uncredentialled gatekeeping mechanism that polices what’s for “us” even when it’s been made—at least in part—by “us.”
Whether country will accept Beyonce or not is uncertain, but one thing is certain: Beyonce knows how to make music.
With inputs from agencies
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