As Grammy Voting Opens Today, Here Are 18 Categories We’re Watching (And Why)

Why We’re Watching It: Billie Eilish could receive her third record of the year award for “What Was I Made For?,” which would put her in a three-way tie as the artist with the most wins in the category. She would join Paul Simon (counting two Simon & Garfunkel hits) and Bruno Mars (counting a collab with Anderson. Paak as Silk Sonic). This would make Eilish the first woman to win three times; the first artist to win three times strictly as a solo artist; and the first artist to win three times in the space of five years. Eilish previously won for “Bad Guy” and “Everything I Wanted.”

What Else Is Nominated? Jon Batiste’s “Worship,” boygenius’ “Not Strong Enough,” Miley Cyrus’ “Flowers,” Victoria Monét’s “On My Mama,” Olivia Rodrigo’s “Vampire,” Taylor Swift’s “Anti-Hero,” SZA’s “Kill Bill”

Why We’re Watching It: Taylor Swift could receive her fourth album of the year award for Midnights, which would make her the artist with the most awards in the category. She previously won for Fearless, 1989 and Folklore. She’s currently tied at three wins each with Frank Sinatra, Stevie Wonder and Paul Simon (again, counting a Simon & Garfunkel album).

But SZA is a very strong challenger with SOS. She’s vying to become the first Black woman to win in this category as a lead artist since Lauryn Hill won 25 years ago for The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill.

Jon Batiste’s World Music Radio is also nominated, two years after he was the surprise winner in the category for We Are. Winning again so soon would be a long shot for Batiste, but if it happens, he’ll be the first artist to win twice in the space of three years as a lead artist since the mid-’70s, when Stevie Wonder won three times in a four-year span.

What Else Is Nominated? boygenius’ The Record, Miley Cyrus’ Endless Summer Vacation, Lana Del Rey’s Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, Janelle Monáe’s The Age of Pleasure, Olivia Rodrigo’s GUTS

Also Note: Serban Ghenea could become the first person (not artist, mind you) to win album of the year five times. The Canadian engineer/mixer has two albums in the running this year – Swift’s Midnights and Rodrigo’s Guts. Ghenea previously won in the category as an engineer/mixer on Swift’s 1989 and Folklore, Adele’s 25 and Bruno Mars’ 24K Magic. 

Why We’re Watching It: Taylor Swift could finally win her first award in this category for “Anti-Hero,” which she co-wrote with Jack Antonoff. Swift has received more nominations in this category (seven) than anyone in history, but has yet to win. If “Anti-Hero” wins, it will be the second win in this category for Antonoff, who co-wrote fun.’s Janelle Monáe-featuring smash “We Are Young,” which won in 2013. That would put him in a tie for the most wins in this category with (take a deep breath) Henry Mancini and Johnny Mercer, James Horner, Will Jennings, U2, Adele, Bruno Mars and Christopher Brody Brown and Dernst Emile II (D’Mile).

Three other songwriters are also vying for their second wins in the category. Billie Eilish & Finneas, nominated for “What Was I Made For?,” won three years ago for “Bad Guy.” Dan Wilson, nominated for co-writing “Butterfly” with Jon Batiste, won in 2007 for co-writing The Chicks’ “Not Ready to Make Nice.”

What Else Is Nominated? “A&W” (Jack Antonoff, Lana Del Rey & Sam Dew), “Dance the Night” (Caroline Ailin, Dua Lipa, Mark Ronson & Andrew Wyatt), “Flowers” (Miley Cyrus, Gregory Aldae Hein & Michael Pollack), “Kill Bill” (Rob Bisel, Carter Lang & SZA), “Vampire” (Daniel Nigro & Olivia Rodrigo)

Why We’re Watching It: If Jelly Roll, 39, wins best artist, he’ll become the oldest solo artist to win in that category. That distinction is currently held by Sheryl Crow, who was 33 when she won on March 1, 1995. (Note: Ward Swingle, leader of The Swingle Singers, was 36 when that choral group won in 1964.)

If The War & Treaty, consisting of married couple Michael Trotter Jr. and Tanya Trotter, wins, they’ll become the first married duo to win in this category. Starland Vocal Band, which included a married couple (and also a future married couple), won in 1977. That group consisted of Bill Danoff and Taffy Nivert, who were married from 1972-82, and Jon Carroll and Margot Chapman, who were married from 1978-81. Starland Vocal Band is best known for “Afternoon Delight,” a No. 1 hit on the Hot 100 in 1976.

Who Else Is Nominated? Gracie Abrams, Fred again.., Ice Spice, Coco James, Noah Kahan, Victoria Monét

Why We’re Watching It: Jack Antonoff could win in this category for the third consecutive year. He would become only the second producer to win in three consecutive years, following Babyface (1995-97). Three other producers – David Foster, Quincy Jones and Pharrell Williams – won three times, but those wins weren’t consecutive.

Who Else Is Nominated? Dernst Emile II (D’Mile), Hit-Boy, Metro Boomin, Daniel Nigro

Why We’re Watching It: Kelly Clarkson could become the first three-time winner in this category if she wins for Chemistry. She previously won for Breakaway and Stronger. She’s currently tied with Adele with two wins in the category.

Three of this year’s other nominees – Olivia Rodrigo (GUTS), Ed Sheeran (- Subtract) and Taylor Swift (Midnights) – are each looking for their second wins in the category.

What Else Is Nominated? Miley Cyrus’s Endless Summer Vacation

Why We’re Watching It: Skrillex and The Chemical Brothers are currently tied for most wins in this category (three each). Both are nominated again this year, for Quest for Fire and For That Beautiful Feeling, respectively. If either wins, they’ll break the tie and pull ahead.

What Else Is Nominated? James Blake’s Playing Robots Into Heaven, Fred again..’s Actual Life 3 (January 1- September 9 2022), Kx5’s Kx5

Why We’re Watching It: If “Angry” (which Mick Jagger and Keith Richards co-wrote with Andrew Watt) wins, it would be the Glimmer Twins’ first win in a songwriting category. Their only previous nominations in songwriting categories were for The Verve’s “Bittersweet Symphony” (which sampled an Andrew Oldham Orchestra recording of their “The Last Time”) and their own “Doom and Gloom.” (The Grammys were resistant to rock when The Stones were in their prime.)

If “Rescued” by Foo Fighters wins, it would be the group’s fourth song to win in this category, following “Walk,” “Run” and “Waiting on a War.” Moreover, Foos Dave Grohl and Pat Smear won for co-writing the Paul McCartney track “Cut Me Some Slack.” A fifth win here for Grohl and Smear would allow them to move ahead of Bruce Springsteen for the most wins in this category.

What Else Is Nominated? “Ballad of a Homeschooled Girl” (Daniel Nigro & Olivia Rodrigo), “Emotion Sickness (Queens of the Stone Age), “Not Strong Enough” (boygenius)

Why We’re Watching It: If Boygenius’ The Record wins, this will be the second year in a row that a group or duo consisting entirely of women has won in this category. Wet Leg, comprised of Rhian Teasdale and Hester Chambers, won last year for their eponymous debut album. Two bands with women members, The White Stripes and Alabama Shakes, had previously won the award. Boygenius consists of singer-songwriters Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus.

What Else Is Nominated? Arctic Monkeys’ The Car, Lana Del Rey’s Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd, Gorillaz’s Cracker Island, PJ Harvey’s I Inside the Old Year Dying

Why We’re Watching It: If Victoria Monét’s “Hollywood” (on which Hazel Monét, age two, and R&B legends Earth, Wind & Fire are featured) wins best traditional R&B performance, Hazel will become the youngest Grammy winner to date. That title is currently held by Leah Peasall of The Peasall Sisters, who was eight when the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack won album of the year in 2002. The youngest individual winner is currently Blue Ivy Carter, who was nine in 2021 when Beyoncé’s “Brown Skin Girl,” on which she was featured (along with Wizkid), won best music video.

What Else Is Nominated? Babyface featuring Coco Jones’ “Simple,” Kenyon Dixon’s “Lucky,” PJ Morton featuring Susan Carol’s “Good Morning,” SZA’s “Love Language”

Why We’re Watching It: If “The Hillbillies” by Baby Keem featuring Kendrick Lamar wins here, this would be Lamar’s seventh win in the category, extending his record. Keem and Lamar won in this category two years ago with “Family Ties.” They would become just the second pair to win twice, following Jay-Z and Kanye West, who won for “Otis” and “N—as in Paris.”

What Else Is Nominated? Black Thought’s “Love Letter,” Drake & 21 Savage’s “Rich Flex,” Killer Mike featuring André 3000, Future and Eryn Allen Kane’s “Scientists & Engineers,” Coi Leray’s “Players”

Why We’re Watching It: Bruce Springsteen’s Only the Strong Survive, a cover album of R&B and soul songs, is a strong contender here. It would be Springsteen’s first Grammy win in 14 years, and his fourth in an album category. He won best rock album for The Rising, best traditional folk vocal album for We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions and best contemporary folk album for The Ghost of Tom Joad. Springsteen would be the first winner in the traditional pop category to also win in any of these three other categories – a sign of his broad appeal.

Pentatonix’s Holidays Around the World would be the first holiday album to win in this category.

Meanwhile, two of the nominated albums are tributes to composer Stephen Sondheim, who died in 2021 – Liz Callaway’s To Steve With Love: Liz Callaway Celebrates Sondheim and the Various Artists collection Sondheim Unplugged (The NYC Sessions), Vol. 3.

What Else Is Nominated? Rickie Lee Jones’ Pieces of Treasure, Laufey’s Bewitched

Why We’re Watching It: If Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street wins, it would be the fifth show to win twice in the category, following Gypsy, Les Miserables, West Side Story and Into the Woods. Stephen Sondheim wrote music and lyrics to both Into the Woods and Sweeney Todd and wrote lyrics for both Gypsy (composed by Jule Styne) and West Side Story (composed by Leonard Bernstein). Now, that’s what you call owning your lane.

Shucked also has a good chance. The songs were co-written by three-time Grammy winner Shane McAnally, who is nominated for songwriter of the year, non-classical, and Brandy Clark, who has amassed 17 nominations since 2013 (but no wins).

What Else Is Nominated? Kimberly Akimbo (Jeanine Tesori, David Lindsay-Abaire), Parade (Jason Robert Brown) and Some Like It Hot (Scott Wittman, Marc Shaiman)

Why We’re Watching It: If Michelle Obama’s The Light We Carry: Overcoming in Uncertain Times wins, Obama will become the first first lady or former first lady to win twice in this category. She won four years ago for Becoming. Hillary Rodham Clinton won once while she was first lady for It Takes a Village. Moreover, if Obama wins again, she’ll pull even with her husband, who won twice while he was a U.S. Senator.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is vying to become the third sitting U.S. Senator to win in this category, for It’s OK to be Angry About Capitalism. The first two were Sen. Everett Dirksen (R-Ill.), who won in 1968 for Gallant Men, and Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), who won in 2006 for Dreams from My Father and 2008 for The Audacity of Hope. (Hillary Rodham Clinton and Al Franken won before they became U.S. Senators.)

Rick Rubin (The Creative Act: A Way of Being) is vying to become the first superstar producer to win in this category since Quincy Jones won in 2002 for Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones. Rubin is a nine-time Grammy winner.

What Else Is Nominated: Meryl Streep’s Big Tree, William Shatner’s Boldly Go: Reflections on a Life of Awe and Wonder

Why We’re Watching It: If John Williams wins, it would be his record-extending 11th win in the category. Williams is nominated for both The Fabelmans and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.

Williams has won in the category for Jaws, Star Wars, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Superman, The Empire Strikes Back, Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Schindler’s List, Saving Private Ryan, Memoirs of a Geisha and Star Wars: The Force Awakens. He has won in every decade from the 1970s through the 2010s. A win this year would give him wins in six consecutive decades.

(Williams, a 25-time Grammy winner, is nominated in three categories this year. If he wins them all, he will tie Quincy Jones for third place on the all-time Grammy leaderboard. Beyoncé leads with 32 awards, followed by the late classical conductor Georg Solti with 31 and Jones with 28.)

Ludwig Göransson also has two nominations in this category, for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Oppenheimer. The Swedish composer won five years ago for the first Black Panther.

What Else Is Nominated? Barbie (Mark Ronson & Andrew Wyatt)

Why We’re Watching It: If Kendrick Lamar’s “Count Me Out” wins, Lamar would become the first three-time winner in the category. He previously won as a featured artist on Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood” and as the lead artist on “Humble.” He’s currently tied with Peter Gabriel, Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Johnny Cash, Beyoncé and Swift with two wins each in this category.

Billie Eilish is nominated for “What Was I Made For?,” on which she was the sole director. If she were to win, this would the second year in a row that an artist has won for a video on which they were the sole director. Taylor Swift’s “All Too Well: The Short Film” won last year.

The Beatles’ “I’m Only Sleeping” is also nominated, though the Fab Four (or what’s left of it) wouldn’t personally win if their video won.

What Else Is Nominated: Tyler Childers’ “In Your Love,” Troye Sivan’s “Rush.”

Why We’re Watching It: If Bob Dylan’s Fragments – Time Out of Mind Sessions (1996-1997): The Bootleg Series, Vol. 17 wins, it will be the third edition of The Bootleg Series to win in this category and will put Dylan just behind jazz legend Billie Holiday as the most-honored artist in this category. Four Holiday collections have won the award. The award in this category goes to the compilation producers, mastering engineers and restoration engineer, if there is one, not the artist, but the award also reflects on the stature of the artist. Almost all of the winning collections have been by legendary artists.

Dylan and The Band’s The Bootleg Series Vol. 11: The Basement Tapes Complete won in 2016. Dylan’s The Bootleg Series Vol. 12: The Cutting Edge 1965-1966 won in 2017.

What Else Is Nominated?: A Lou Reed collection, Words & Music, May 1965—Deluxe Edition, as well as three Various Artists collections – The Moaninest Moan of Them All: The Jazz Saxophone of Loren McMurray, 1920-1922, Playing for the Man at the Door: Field Recordings From the Collection of Mack McCormick, 1958-1971 and Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos.

Why We’re Watching It: David Frost could become the first eight-time winner in this category. He’s currently tied with Steven Epstein, Robert Woods and Judith Sherman with seven wins each. Frost is the son of classical producer Thomas Frost, who won in this category in 1987.

Elaine Martone, who won in 2007, is vying for her second win in the category.

Who Else Is Nominated? Morten Lindberg, Dmitriy Lipay, Brian Pidgeon