Awards season is always a hope-filled reminder that even today’s biggest stars started out at the very beginning…as hustlers and dreamers. With a little bit of luck and a lot of talent, they end up on the biggest stages of their respective industries and often times – especially the new rising stars – take a moment to reflect on the very beginning, and the opportunities that do – or do not – exist for others.

Our very own 2018 Grammy-award winner, BYGMusic Founder and CEO Krish Sharma, who won for his work on The Rolling Stones’ Blue & Lonesome, was present to take it all in in person.

Serving as the ultimate reminder of why BYGMusic was founded to begin with – to give emerging talent a chance to continue creating and keep chasing the bright lights with the support of music-aligned brands – here we reflect on some of the Grammy speeches that struck a chord.

Alessia Cara

“There are some incredible artists out there that are making incredible music that deserve to be acknowledged that don’t always get acknowledged because of popularity contests or numbers games, and that’s kind of unfortunate,” said Cara. “I just wanted to encourage everyone to support real music and real artists because everyone deserves the same shot.”

Kendrick Lamar

“Most importantly, [hip-hop] showed me the true definition of what being an artist was,” Lamar said. “From the jump I thought it was about the accolades and the cars and the globes, but it’s really about expressing yourself and putting the paint on the canvas for the world to evolve for the next listener, the next generation after that.”

Residente

“It’s sad to see how the music industry is becoming numbers,” said Residente. “That has to change. I’m dedicating this to people who make real music because they really love it and they don’t care about YouTube views, followers, Spotify spins, top selling records, Top 20 on the radio. This is for all these people that make art and they love it.”

Bruno Mars

As one of the biggest winners of the night, Bruno spoke about performing at age 16 in front of a thousand people while growing up in Hawaii. Seeing those people laugh and enjoy themselves inspired him to make music, he said.

“I had a set list of 10 or 12 songs I would sing,” he said. “Later, I learned that most of those songs were written by either Babyface, Terry Jam or Teddy Riley. They were fun songs.”

Congratulations to all of this year’s winners…and here’s to the next generation of stars – of all sizes – who move us.