Usher has had quite the return to the spotlight,t and he continued his winning streak at the 2024 NAACP Image Awards.
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From his record-breaking Tiny Desk performance to his sold-out Las Vegas residency and a Super Bowl performance for the ages, the timeless heartthrob has proven we still like it his way.
On Saturday, Mar. 17, Usher was presented with the President’s Award at the 55th Annual NAACP Image Awards. He also took home honors for Entertainer of the Year and Outstanding Male Artist.
The newlywed was dapper and dimpled as usual when accepting his well-deserved trophies. During his speech, he paid tribute to his mother, Jonetta Patton, for her role as both a supportive single parent as well as an unrelenting manager.
The 45-year-old superstar spoke on their journey, saying,
“I’m very honored to receive this amazing award; from the depths of my soul, my passion work is what has mattered to me since my mother has made me understand what the opportunity to be able to speak to the entire world is. I wanted to make it known that far too often, women in our industry [don’t] get the recognition that they truly deserve.
“When we first started, it was even harder for a mother to believe in the dreams that I had because I was unwavering, being raised without a father. In our home being raised [by] a single parent…it was a lot. But [mom], if anybody deserves it more than anybody, it’s her.”
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Usher noted that Patton took on managing her son with no previous music industry experience.
The tenacity that it took to look within a male-dominated industry and believe in your son unwaveringly, no matter how hard those board rooms may have been, she didn’t have the experience…but because of that, I have this moment.
With this honor, Usher joins the ranks of past President’s Award recipients like Lauryn Hill, Jay-Z, LeBron James and Rihanna.