WorldBeat

42nd Annual Grammy Awards: Elton John Wins Legend Award; Carlos Santana Continues Musical Comeback and Takes Eight Awards Home

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

SERENA YANG, HOST: Hi. I'm Serena Yang in Los Angeles with a special edition of WORLD BEAT from the biggest awards show in the musical calendar, the Grammys.

It's among the most coveted of prizes for performing arts anywhere in the world. A Grammy means recognition by your musical peers, the 15,000 members of the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences, otherwise known as the Recording Academy.

During the past 12 months, WORLD BEAT featured no less than 90 of this year's nominated artists as we follow the road to the Grammys. TLC, The Backstreet Boys, Ricky Martin and Carlos Santana topped the nominations list. As for the awards, well, here's a round up of the cheers, tears and magical moments.

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UNIDENTIFIED HOST: And the Grammy goes to...

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: And the Grammy goes to...

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: And the Grammy goes to...

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: Supernatural, Santana.

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: Smooth, Santana.

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: Smooth.

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Santana Featuring Bob Thomas, "Smooth"

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YANG (voice-over): By the night's end, the sound of Carlos Santana being summoned to the stage was as familiar as the sound of his album Supernatural on 12 million CD players across the world. A record equaling eight Grammys meant eight speeches, a task which the veteran guitarist performed with eloquence.

CARLOS SANTANA, MUSICIAN: It feels great to be able to touch so many people's hearts more than anything, to go to Jerusalem and make Hebrews and Palestinians dance or apaches or Japanese. To me it's just more family and this music validates the existence that together we can make music to heal this planet.

ROB THOMAS, SINGER: I'd love to thank Mr. Carlos Santana for giving an opportunity to me like this. And I'd like to thank my band for loaning me out for a short period of time.

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: And the best new artist is...

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: Come on, come on.

UNIDENTIFIED HOST: Christina Aguilera.

CHRISTINA AGUILERA, SINGER: I was like is that my name? I totally didn't even recognize it. I was just like, because I was expecting, you know, either Macy or Rene (ph), somebody else to win.

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Britney Spears, Unidentified Song

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YANG: Other shutouts were delivered to The Backstreet Boys and Ricky Martin, despite a combined total of eight nominations. Though Martin and Marc Anthony delivered fiery stage performances, the Academy delivered awards to more senior Latin statesmen Ruben Blades, Tito Puente and Los Vandba (ph).

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Sting, "Desert Rose"

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YANG: Sting's "Desert Rose" was in full bloom as he scooped up a couple of unexpected Grammys.

STING, MUSICIAN: Yeah, I was generally really surprised but really happy and pleased. I was happy to be nominated, to be honest with you. But this is number 14 on my mantelpiece so I'm a very fortunate human being.

YANG: And another unexpected double scoop went to R&B veteran Barry White, his first Grammy wins coming in his middle 50s.

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Cher, "Believe"

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YANG: Other fiftysomethings with a first Grammy win included Cher and Black Sabbath.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) Sheryl Crow, "Sweet Child O' Mine"

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SHERYL CROW, MUSICIAN: And I was in such a fabulous category of women, women who actually are very good friends of mine. So when they called my name I was stunned. I just wanted to hand it -- well, let me give it to Sarah. No, let me give it to Marcia. No, let me give it to Ahnee (ph). I love Tourea (ph), you know?

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Dixie Chicks, Unidentified Song

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YANG: Country winners span the generations, from Dixie Chicks and Shania Twain to George Jones and Dolly Parton.

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Susan Tedeschi, Unidentified Song

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YANG: While newcomer Susan Tedeschi failed in her bid for best new artist, Grammy awards could help lift the blues from B.B. King and Robert Craig. The roots of rap were rewarded along with Erykah Badu, who later switched musical styles to front an all star trio with jazz vocal Grammy winner Diana Krall.

ERYKAH BADU, SINGER: You know, my song was with me, the creator was in me, the performance with George Benson and Diana Krall was legendary. TLC's album "Fan Mail" earned Grammys for best R&B album, song and performance.

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TLC, Unidentified Song

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BILLY JOEL, MUSICIAN: I am proud to present this legend award to a man who is not only one of my heroes but a man I'm proud to call one of my close friends. As we say in New York, he's good people.

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Elton John, "Philadelphia Freedom"

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SIR ELTON JOHN, MUSICIAN: Who's to say what the best record is or whatever? You know, I just feel, you know, this is the first time I've ever done the Grammys in 30 years of my career and it's very nice to get this award and it's very generous of the American Recording, you know, people to give me it because my career started in America. But I still feel that these shows sometimes are full of bull____.

YANG: If Sir Elton John seemed less than thrilled with his Grammy legend award, the story of Santana's eight awards will remain the true legend of the millennium's first Grammy night.

CLIVE DAVIS, PRESIDENT, ARISTA RECORDS: Any time an artist breaks through they wonder how long can I last? What will happen with the sophomore jinx? What will happen beyond that? And this album shows that if your music remains great not only can your career last, but it could soar to phenomenal heights.

SANTANA: We look forward to playing for Mr. Desmond Tutu, Mr. Mandela, going to China, going to play for the aborigines and, you know, I'm a dreamer, you know? And today's dreams are tomorrow's reality. I guess more than ever I want to do more with my wife, just for a month, and my children. But after that we'll see what god wants to do.

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YANG: Winning a Grammy not only looks great on any artist's resume, but it can also provide a significant boost to sales of an album which may have peaked months earlier. When we return, we'll bring you the best sellers in WORLD BEAT'S exclusive global album chart and a special award for one of music's most endearing and enduring performers, Sir Elton John.

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Top Ten:

10. TOM JONES, "Reload" 9. THE COORS, "MTV Unplugged 8. METALLICA, "S&M" 7. BRITNEY SPEARS, "Baby One More Time" 6. RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS, "Californication" 5. ENIGMA, "The Screen Behind the Mirror" 4. MACY GRAY, "On How Life Is" 3. SHANIA TWAIN, "Come On Over" 2. CELINE DION, "All The Way" 1. SANTANA, "Supernatural"

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YANG: Welcome back to Los Angeles where it's an important week in the 30 year career of Sir Elton John. A special Grammy legend award recognizes his contribution to the music industry and the Recording Academy's charity at the MusiCares Foundation acknowledges his philanthropy with an all star tribute here at the Twentieth Century Fox studios.

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Elton John, "Saturday Night's Alright (For Fighting)"

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STING: Clearly one of the greatest musical talents that we have, you know? And being British I feel pretty patriotic about him.

TONY BLAIR, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: This is a special award which is not just for your music, but for your generosity, you're kindness of spirit, the work you do for charity everywhere. So we can't think of anyone better to be the music cast person of the year.

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Elton John, "Burn Down the Mission"

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MICHAEL GREENE, NARAS PRESIDENT/CEO: The people here behind me are here because they care about the charity but I think more importantly they're here because we have all been touched. We have stolen his licks for so many decades.

DIANA KRALL, MUSICIAN: Well, I started practicing his songs when I was 15 years old probably.

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Diana Krall, "Border Song"

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STING: He is an incredible generous man, a very funny man, great company. And he's also one of my best friends.

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Elton John, "Cone Down In Time"

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TONY BENNETT, SINGER: Oh, he's a great artist, great performer, you know? The people, he just hypnotizes the whole world.

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Elton John, "Philadelphia Freedom"

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CROW: I know every time I think of an album of his, he's going to have great stuff on it. He just continues to grow and incorporate new sounds and he's just, you know, he's the goods to me.

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Stevie Wonder, "Daniel"

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BENNETT: Elton, this is a beautiful night for you but I must admit this, you know, back stage when we were taking the photo shoot it was the first time I was ever kissed on the lips by a man and I liked it very much.

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Lulu, "Sorry Seems To Be the Hardest Word"

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LULU, SINGER: He is quite a being and quite a force to be reckoned with and he does so much good. He heals, I think, on many levels.

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Jewel and Moby, "Your Song"

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JOHN: All these people on stage here are givers and that's the most important thing. I get very embarrassed about receiving things.

LULU: He gets bashful and shy. He doesn't want people to say nice things about him, he just wants to get on with it and he wants to give.

JOHN: You must give. You must always give. There are people out there that need your help all the time. Thank you my fellow artists for being such supportive people.

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Elton John, "Saturday Night's Alright (For Fighting)"

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YANG: Only 20 percent of the Grammy awards make it onto the televised part of the show, with the vast majority of categories awarded earlier in the evening. These winners includes both household names and less familiar faces, but they share the same stage and the same achievement.

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PHIL COLLINS, MUSICIAN: You never saw it on television and it's not the big telecast. But it's still your award, you know? And so I wanted to be here even if I didn't get him, I wanted to be here, you know, along with the classic guys and along with the jazz and along with the gospel people. Yeah, it's a big moment in everybody's life if you're a musician.

YANG: Tell me how this project is particularly special to you?

COLLINS: Well, I mean first of all I've never done it. I became part of a wonderful team at Disney and I was hoping to contribute to, you know, their legacy. And I think we have certainly done that. I mean looking back at the thing, I mean it's their second biggest film probably after "Lion King."

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Phil Collins, "You'll Be In My Heart", From "Tarzan"

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YANG: Phil, of course, the question of the evening has got to be how does it feel to take home a Grammy tonight?

COLLINS: It feels very nice. I haven't let my family down and I haven't let Disney down. It's very nice. I'm very -- it doesn't get old, you know?

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RIZ KHAN, "THE BEAT" (voice-over): Thousands of miles from the Grammys, Israelis were coping with a different musical emotion on Wednesday, mourning the loss of singer Ofrah Haza (ph). Israel's first female pop idol died after a two week fight against a mystery illness. She was just 41 years old.

Her rise from poverty to superstardom earned her the nickname Israel's Cinderella. She pioneered a unique fusion of ancient Yemenite traditions with technobeats. Haza performed before Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, Foreign Minister Shimon Peres and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat when they won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994. And Israel's current premier, Ehud Barak, was among those mourning the loss to his country and the musical world.

I'm Riz Khan and that's "The Beat."

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YANG: It's been an amazing year for Carlos Santana. After a 20 year absence from the charts, his latest record, "Supernatural," has sold more than 10 million copies worldwide and won him eight Grammy awards. He's the toast of the music world, with the comeback story of the year.

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YANG (voice-over): Santana is back and not by accident. Having been largely absent from radio in recent years, the Grammy winning artist decided it was time to reach out to a new audience with help from an old mentor.

SANTANA: Supernatural came together because of my wife, Debra's (ph) vision for me to connect with Mr. Clyde Davis.

DAVIS: I really felt the time was right now for him to have half of the album and for me to, in effect, have half of the album and approach the young musicians of today and his response was, he said listen, A, I've been waiting for this kind of work, I've got two young children. They want to hear me on the radio again.

YANG: The album reunites the guitarist with Davis, who signed Santana to his first record contract in 1968.

SANTANA: I always dreamed of being with Mr. Clyde Davis in Columbia at that time because I saw this poster for Christmas, it was a Christmas kind of postcard, a huge poster with Bob Dylan, Miles Davis, Barbra Streisand, Johnny Mathis, Johnny Cash, Paul Simon, on and on, Janis Joplin, all those incredible people. And I said this is where I want to be, with all these people. And when I actually met him and we signed, you know, I was -- it was like I won the lottery.

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Santana, "Black Magic Woman/Gypsy Queen"

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DAVIS: I saw the Santana band and I was electrified by their combination of blues and rock and Latin influences, the freshness of it, the heat of it and I just said on the spot this is for me, for Columbia. I was head of Columbia Records at the time. And so I signed Santana and of course it just erupted.

YANG: For the next year, the group was caught up in a wave of popularity that led to their historic appearance at the Woodstock festival in 1969.

SANTANA: For me it's still unbelievable that one minute we just got out of high school, the next thing we were playing with B.B. King, Mr. B.B. King and Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin and The Doors and Sly Stone and like woah, this is really, really fast, you know?

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Santana, "Oye Como Va"

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YANG: Woodstock was just the beginning. The world embraced Santana and the band scored four double platinum albums in four years. But eventually, success took its toll.

SANTANA: Once you reach the top, where are you going to go? And so when we reached the top, everybody was dying, you know? Jimi Hendrix died, Jim Morrison died, Janis Joplin was dying, all kinds of musicians are dying and it was really two roads. One was heroin and the other one was spiritual meditation.

YANG: Santana's spiritual discoveries through Eastern philosophy changed his life. Today, that spirituality continues to inspire his music.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) Santana, "(Da Le) Yaleo"

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SANTANA: The music has an enormous power to, I guess kind of like a shaman, you know? It takes you into a place where time doesn't exist anymore, gravity doesn't exist, fear doesn't exist. Miles Davis used to call it a spiritual orgasm, you know, and that's exactly what it is. Because a lot of people have told me many times in my career that I'm doing, I'm committing career suicide, you know, when you embrace certain players or when I played with Miles or Johnny Hooker or Wayne Shorter or John McLaughlin (ph) who brought -- people always tell me you're committing career suicide because, you know, you're pop and you should just play rock and roll pop. And I said no, you know, it's time for me to get an education. I'm not a Xerox machine repeating the same thing, you know? You've got to like stick your neck out and discover something different.

I don't work on selling units or moving CDs or -- you know, I work on touching people with the music. That's my passion.

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Santana, "Wishing It Was"

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YANG: With platinum sales and Grammy buzz for Supernatural, it's clear that he has touched audiences and fellow musicians alike.

DAVIS: There are very few all timers. Carlos Santana is someone for all time. There wasn't anybody with whom he collaborated that did not thank me that this was such an honor and not in a paying tribute but it was one of those magical musical experiences that will affect them really forever.

SANTANA: This music has the bug of a spiritual virus that will counteract the cancer of fear, brutality, violence and equality for women, one love, a love supreme brings peace, light, love and joy, things that they're not mumbo jumbo or goodly goop anymore, things that are becoming extremely necessary in this planet today.

When you can convince young people that whatever it is that they do they can make a difference in the world, then it's a miracle. So this whole CD is a real miracle from the beginning to the very, very end.

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YANG: That's all from this special edition of WORLD BEAT from the 42nd Annual Grammy Awards in Los Angeles.

Brooke Alexander will return next week. Until then, I'm Serena Yang leaving you with a last look at one of the musical moments that helped define the musical event of the year.

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