Folk musicians take home top Grammys

Veteran folk artist Shawn Colvin won song and record of the year for "Sunny Came Home"

NEW YORK (CNN) -- Singer-songwriters in the folk music tradition dominated the 40th annual Grammy Awards Ceremony on Wednesday as the recording industry honored folk music legend Bob Dylan with three Grammys including album of the year for his critically acclaimed "Time Out of Mind."

Song of the year and record of the year honors went to another veteran folk performer, Shawn Colvin, whose "Sunny Came Home" -- which she co-wrote with John Leventhal -- was a tale of vengeance open to wide interpretation.

"A lot of people thought it was like a 'Carrie'-like scenario, somebody who'd been made fun of in school and then went home to bomb or torch the school," Colvin said after accepting the award.

The best new artist Award went to Paula Cole, who sang her ballad, "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?" for the telecast from Radio City Music Hall. It was her only prize of the evening despite seven nominations. Her Lilith Fair tour mate and the tour's founder, Sarah McLachlan, won two Grammys, one for female pop vocal performance and one for pop instrumental performance.

R. Kelly a multiple winner for 'Space Jam' song

R. Kelly's inspirational ballad, "I Believe I Can Fly," brought him three Grammys

The crowd gave a standing ovation to R. Kelly for his performance of "I Believe I Can Fly," which won for best male rhythm and blues performance, best rhythm and blues song and best song specifically written for a motion picture.

"It turned out to be something bigger than the movie," said Kelly, whose song was featured in "Space Jam." "I feel the song was a seed planted especially for kids around the world, you know, and anybody else that is down, it kind of lifted them up so I'm glad about that."

There was another standing ovation for Aretha Franklin, who filled in for an ailing Luciano Pavarotti. Only minutes after she sang her signature song, "Respect," she sang the "Nessun Dorma" aria from Puccini's opera "Turandot."

LeAnn Rimes sang her version of "How Do I Live" for the Grammys telecast, but it was Trisha Yearwood's version of the same song -- written by Diane Warren -- that won best female country performance.

Warren's ballad lost to the Bob Carlisle song "Butterfly Kisses" in the best country song category.

Dylan performance interrupted

Bob Dylan also performed for the Grammys. Wearing a silver tuxedo jacket, he paid homage to Buddy Holly, saying he heard Holly play when he was 16. "He looked at me and I just have some kind of feeling that he was ... with us all the time we were making this record in some kind of way."

Speaking in a rough, hipster drawl, he then segued to another old favorite, the great blues man Robert Johnson: "In the words, you know, of the immortal Robert Johnson, 'the stuff we got will bust your brains out.'"

Dylan's performance was interrupted by a shirtless man with the words "Soy Bomb" written on his chest

Dylan's performance saw one of two interruptions in the telecast. As he performed his award-winning "Love Sick," a shirtless man with the words "Soy Bomb" written on his chest in large, black block letters leapt on stage and did a robotic dance for some 30 seconds before being hustled offstage. Dylan merely raised his eyebrows quizzically at the disruption and kept singing.

The show was interrupted again by a red-shirted ODB of the rap group Wu-Tang Clan, who grabbed the microphone as Colvin was walking to the Radio City Music Hall stage to accept the first of her two awards for "Sunny Came Home."

Apparently upset at losing the best rap album Grammy to Puff Daddy, he complained that he spent a lot of money for new clothes because he thought he was going to win. "Puffy is good, but Wu-Tang is the best," he said.

Denver among six posthumous Grammys

Six posthumous Grammys were awarded by the Recording Academy. Among them, John Denver, who was killed in a plane accident off the California coastlast year, won one -- the only one of his career, which peaked in the 1970s. Television journalist Charles Kuralt won two, both in the spoken word categories.

And Sir Georg Solti's win, the conductor's 31st, set a record. He won the opera recording trophy for "Wagner: Die Meistersinger Von Nurnberg." He died in September at age 84.

Only 14 of the 92 Grammys were given out during the three-hour broadcast, with an estimated audience of 1.5 billion people in 195 countries around the world.

Correspondent Mark Scheerer and Reuters contributed to this report.

Related stories:

• List of Grammy award winners
• Grammy Awards honor music business' top performers - February 25, 1998
• List of Grammy award nominations - January 6, 1998
• '60s artists, Babyface, Paula Cole compete for Grammys - January 6, 1998

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