Sam Smith swept the board at this year's Grammys, and thanked an ex-boyfriend for the heartbreak that inspired such success.

The 22-year-old's wins, including the two top awards of song and record of the year, eclipsed global superstars Beyonce and Pharrell Williams, who each walked away with three gongs compared to Smith's four.

Describing the night as the best of his life Smith had one special person to thank - the inspiration behind In The Lonely Hour which featured the massive hit Stay With Me.

He told the celebrity crowd gathered at the Staples Centre in Los Angeles: "Just a quick one - I want to thank the man who this record is about, who I fell in love with last year. Thank you so much for breaking my heart because you got me four Grammys."

Ahead of the marathon ceremony that lasted more than three hours Smith had modestly said he was happy just to have people listen to his music.

He said: "I'm just happy people know who I am. Last year, no one knew who I was."

Accepting his second award, for best pop vocal having already been named best new artist, Smith said his success came only when he learned to be himself.

He told the audience: "I just wanna say that before I made this record, I was doing everything to try to get my music heard ... I tried to lose weight and I was making awful music. It was when I started to be myself that the music flowed."

Smith's impressive win is reminiscent of the success of fellow British singer Adele at the ceremony in 2012 when she scored four awards.

Adele also attributed much of her success to songs written after a heartbreak.

Smith, who performed a duet at the star-studded ceremony with Mary J Blige, kept his Twitter followers up to date with his feelings on wins throughout the event.

In a series of posts he used exclamation marks and tearful emoticons when clearly words were not enough.

A darling of the night, Smith then uploaded pictures of himself with some of the biggest stars there including Rihanna and Taylor Swift.

Speaking backstage whilst clutching his four trophies, Smith said it was awkward trying to juggle them all.

He added: "I feel like Kate Winslet at the Oscars right now."

But instead of celebrating with champagne and haute cuisine he said the first thing on his wish list is fast food: "I need to go to In-N-Out Burger because I've been having a lot of green juice recently. This really is the best night of my life.

Asked what could top this success he said: "A boyfriend would be nice," adding he would like a man with patience who could clean all his Grammys.

Former busker Ed Sheeran, who performed with ELO's Jeff Lynne, left empty-handed despite being nominated in both the best album, won by US singer Beck, and pop vocal album categories.

Other British acts who took to the stage on the night included Chris Martin, Sir Paul McCartney who played with Kanye West and Rihanna, Annie Lennox who sang with Irish act Hozier, and Jessie J and Tom Jones.

Ahead of the main ceremony Clean Bandit triumphed in the best dance category, over fellow British acts Basement Jaxx, Disclosure and Duke Dumont.

Aphex Twin also won best dance/electronic album for his first album in a over decade, Syro.