Inductee Jay-Z speaks onstage in the course of the thirty sixth Annual Rock & Roll Corridor Of Fame Induction Ceremony
Michael Loccisano/Getty Photos for The Rock and Ro
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Michael Loccisano/Getty Photos for The Rock and Ro
Inductee Jay-Z speaks onstage in the course of the thirty sixth Annual Rock & Roll Corridor Of Fame Induction Ceremony
Michael Loccisano/Getty Photos for The Rock and Ro
Rapper Jay-Z was inducted into the Rock & Roll Corridor of Fame on Saturday, in a star-studded ceremony that featured tributes by former President Barack Obama and comic Dave Chappelle.
The induction makes Jay-Z one of many few solo rappers to ever be included within the Rock & Roll Corridor of Fame, alongside artists like the Notorious B.I.G., Tupac Shakur and fellow 2021 inductee LL Cool J.
The legacy of the 23-time Grammy winner was celebrated in an introduction video that included remarks from Rihanna, DJ Khaled and Samuel L. Jackson, amongst others.
Obama’s remarks got here in a separate recording, by which he spoke about what Jay-Z’s music has meant to him at pivotal factors in his life and presidency.
“I’ve turned to Jay-Z’s phrases at completely different factors in my life, whether or not I used to be brushing grime off my shoulder on the marketing campaign path, or sampling his lyrics on the Edmund Pettus Bridge on the fiftieth anniversary of the Selma march to Montgomery,” Obama said, in line with footage of the speech posted to social media. “At present Jay-Z is without doubt one of the most famed artists in historical past and an embodiment of the American dream, a dream he has helped make actual for different younger individuals like him.”
“So let me be one of many first to welcome dwelling the child from Marcy homes … as an official Rock and Roll Corridor of Famer,” he continued.
It was not the primary time Obama has paid tribute to the rapper. The previous president previously honored Jay-Z in 2017, when he turned the primary ever rapper to enter the Songwriters Corridor of Fame. “I am fairly certain I am nonetheless the one President to take heed to Jay Z’s music within the Oval Workplace,” he mentioned on the time.
Jay-Z was additionally inducted in individual by Chappelle, who in latest weeks has been mired in controversy after performing transphobic materials in a brand new Netflix particular.
“I am honored that I bought an opportunity to know you,” Chappelle mentioned, according to a transcript of the remarks posted by Rolling Stone. “You embody Black excellence, how nice we could be.”
“[We] have been advised hip-hop was a fad,” Jay-Z said in his acceptance speech. “Very like punk rock, it gave us this anti-culture, this subgenre. And there have been heroes in it.” After the ceremony the rapper tweeted, “Thanks to everybody in that video bundle, I am positively gonna cry within the automotive.”
Along with Jay-Z, the 2021 checklist of nominees celebrated on the ceremony included The Foo-Fighters, Carole King, Todd Rundgren, Tina Turner and The Go-Go’s.
The Rock & Roll Corridor of Fame induction ceremony airs in full on November twentieth on HBO.
