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Rory Feek Accepts Grammy Award, Dedicates It To His Late Wife, Joey Feek

By Lindsay McCane
Published on: 01:53 PST, Feb 13, 2017

On Sunday, Rory Feek, of the country music duo Joey + Rory, took home his first ever Grammy Award, and dedicated it to his late wife, Joey Feek.

Joey and Rory were made famous after coming in third place on CMT’s singing competition Can You Duet in 2008. However, the world fell in love with the couple after Joey was diagnosed with cervical cancer. Fans all around the world came together to follow Joey’s story, which Rory shared on his blog This Life I Live, and pray for her recovery. Sadly, Joey lost her battle to cancer last March, but before her death, she and Rory recorded their final album, Hymns That Are Important to Us, which took home the award for best gospel roots album.

This album, according to Rory, was the most important one they ever made — Joey’s album, which features 13 tracks that “capture the words and melodies that were the soundtrack to Joey’s childhood,” Rory said in a November 2015 blog post titled “manna from heaven.”

https://vimeo.com/44128073

“[The album is] the one she’s always wanted to make – filled with the hymns she grew up with,” Rory continued. “We recorded it in a studio in Nashville early in the summer – just after recovering from her first big surgery in Chicago. And then she did her vocals where she could… in hotel rooms, our house, wherever and whenever she felt up to singing. In early October, we even did a TV taping of the songs in the concert hall at our farm in front of a live audience. Joey was weak and it was difficult for her, but she was determined. This record means so much to her. It is the songs that are the most important to her.”

Last night, Rory accepted the Grammy Award during the non-televised pre-show ceremony. The deeply religious country music singer fought back tears as he spoke about his wife and her determination to finish the album.

“She sang her vocals in hotel rooms while she did chemo and radiation and it finally came out a year ago, almost exactly,” Rory said, according to the Washington Post. “And we sat together in the final days and watched this award ceremony last year — and she said, ‘If we get nominated, promise me you will come.’ And I said ‘I will.'”

“If we win, I’ll know before you will,” Joey had told him.

“This is to my wife,” he said. “Thank you so much.”

As the Inquisitr previously reported, Joey Feek was diagnosed with stage four cervical cancer in 2014, three months after giving birth to her daughter, Indiana (Indy). She later underwent a radical hysterectomy and several rounds of chemotherapy and radiation. Although she appeared to be getting better, a mid-October scan revealed that her cancer had not only returned, but had spread to other parts of her body, including her colon. Because there was nothing left for the doctors to do, Joey made the heart-wrenching decision to stop treatment and return to her home in hospice care. She passed away on March 4, 2016.

Since Joey’s death, Rory has returned to his home in Tennessee and has been focused on raising Indiana, who will soon turn 3-years-old.

[Featured Image by Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images]

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