The Grammy Awards managed to pull off a celebration of both the living and the dead during Sunday's show, and in return had the highest rated ceremony the show's seen in 28 years.

According to a statement from the Recording Academy, more than 39 million viewers tuned in to see how the show would treat the passing of Whitney Houston, how Adele would handle her first performance since throat surgery, and, of course, who would win in the big categories.

Although it could be said that we pretty much already knew the answer to that question, because Adele picked up all six awards she was nominated for, as expected.

Other repeat winners were the Foo Fighters (who nabbed five honors); Kanye West (who won four); Cee Lo Green (two awards); Skrillex (two awards); Taylor Swift (two awards); The Civil Wars (two awards); jazz musician Chick Corea (two awards); and gospel artist Kirk Franklin, who also won two Grammys.

The size of the audience tuned in to the 2012 Grammys on CBS made it the second largest Grammys broadcast in history.

TVByTheNumbers.com reports that the last time so many people watched the Grammys, it was 1984, when 51.67 million tuned in to watch Michael Jackson clean up at the ceremony with his "Thriller" album.