Singer-songwriter Frank Ocean transcended his competition with a Grammy win for best urban contemporary album at the 55th Grammy Awards on Sunday. Ocean won the award for his critically acclaimed album Channel Ocean which was released in July of 2012. Channel Ocean was nominated for a total of six nominations. Ocean also shared the best rap/sung collaboration award with Jay-Z and Kanye West for “No Church in the Wild” which Ocean co-wrote and sung on the track.
Ocean also delivered a beautiful and moving performance of “Forrest Gump”, a song off of Channel Orange. According to Mtv.com, Ocean played the piano without any difficulty after an altercation with Chris Brown a few weeks ago led to Ocean’s finger being cut. Ocean sang the song while members of the Odd Future collective rode bikes and skateboards on a big screen behind him.
Mtv.com described Ocean’s performance as “simple and powerful” and stated that Ocean “with all of his boyish charm, whistled the song's melody for his outro before he moseyed off in time with the big-screen display, creating the coolest visual effect of the night”.
Last year Ocean revealed that the song was about his first romantic love with a young man that he nicknamed Forrest Gump. This revelation made headlines about Ocean’s sexual orientation. Ocean opened up about his sexuality by posting a letter on his Tumblr blog in which he discussed the first time he fell in love with a man.
During his performance Ocean cheered on the love which inspired his gold-selling major label debut by singing, “I want to see your pom-poms from the stands. You’re on my mind boy”.