Welcome to Beyoncé country. When it comes to the 2025 Grammy Award nominations, “Cowboy Carter” rules the nation.
She leads the nods with 11, bringing her career total to 99 nominations. That makes her the most nominated artist in Grammy history.
“Cowboy Carter” is up for album and country album of the year, and “Texas Hold ’Em” is nominated for record, song and country song of the year.
She also received nominations in a wide swath of genres, including pop, country, Americana and melodic rap performance categories.
This is her first time receiving nominations in the country and Americana categories.
Previously, she and her husband Jay-Z were tied for most career nominations, at 88.
If Beyoncé wins the album of the year, she’ll become the first Black woman to do so in the 21st century.
Lauryn Hill last won in 1999 for “The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill,” joining Natalie Cole and Whitney Houston as the only Black women to take home the Grammys’ top prize.
Post Malone also received his first-ever nominations in the country categories this year, having released his debut country album “F-1 Trillion” in August.
That one is up for a country album and “I Had Some Help,” his collaboration with Morgan Wallen, is nominated for country song and country duo/group performance. They are Wallen’s first-ever Grammy nominations.
Malone is just behind Beyoncé, with seven nominations, tied with Billie Eilish, Kendrick Lamar and Charli XCX, who earned her first nominations as a solo artist.
Lamar’s ubiquitous diss track released during his feud with Drake, “Not Like Us,” has been nominated for record and song of the year, rap song, music video as well as best rap performance.
He has two simultaneous entries in the latter category, a career first: Future & Metro Boomin featuring Lamar, “Like That” is up for best rap performance and best rap song.
This is his third time receiving two simultaneous nominations for best rap song.
Taylor Swift and first-time nominees Sabrina Carpenter and Chappell Roan boast of six nominations each.
Last year, women artists dominated the major categories. This year, that continues somewhat, but the main trend seems to be a variance of genre. In the album of the year category, alongside “Cowboy Carter” is André 3000’s new age, alt-jazz “New Blue Sun” and multi-instrumentalist Jacob Collier’s “Djesse Vol. 4.”
Rising pop stars Carpenter and Roan round it out, with “Short n’ Sweet” and “The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess” respectively, as well as Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department,” Eilish’s “Hit Me Hard and Soft,” and Charli XCX’s rave-ready “BRAT.”
Eilish is the only artist to have her first three albums become nominated for album of the year.
Last year, Swift won album of the year for “Midnights,” breaking the record for most wins in the category with four. This year, she becomes the first-ever woman to have seven career nominations in the category.
“The breadth and the variety of genres represented in the general field feel new and really exciting,” says the Recording Academy CEO and President Harvey Mason Jr.
He credits an active and evolving voting body for its success. “We’ve been very intentional in how we looked at and tried to rebalance our membership.
So not just gender or people of colour, different racial makeup, but also genre equity and trying to make sure that all different types of music in different regions and different locations are being represented in every way possible.”
Only recordings commercially released in the U.S. between Sept. 16, 2023, through Aug. 30, 2024, were eligible for nominations. The final round of Grammy voting, which determines its winners, will take place Dec. 12 through January 3.
In the best new artist category, Carpenter and Roan will go head-to-head, alongside Benson Boone, Doechii, Khruangbin, RAYE, Shaboozey and Teddy Swims.
In the song of the year category, Beyoncé is joined by Eilish with “Birds of a Feather,” Swift and Post Malone with “Fortnight,” Roan’s “Good Luck, Babe!”, Carpenter’s “Please Please Please,” Lamar’s “Not Like Us,” Lady Gaga and Bruno Mars’ “Die With A Smile,” and Shaboozey’s “A Bar Song (Tipsy).”
Shaboozey is also a first-time nominee. His “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” is the biggest song of the year, having spent more weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 than any other — it is so popular, that a remix of the track is also up for remixed recording.
Elsewhere, Shaboozey is nominated in the melodic rap performance category for his feature on Beyoncé’s “SPAGHETTII.” Linda Martell, the first commercially successful Black woman musician in the country, is also featured on the song, delivering the 83-year-old artist her first Grammy nomination.
For the record of the year, “Texas Hold ’Em” will compete against Swift and Post Malone’s “Fortnight,” Eilish’s “Birds of a Father,” Lamar’s “Not Like Us,” Roan’s “Good Luck, Babe!”, Carpenter’s “Espresso,” Charli XCX’s “360,” and the Beatles last new song, the AI-assisted “Now and Then.”
“We’re trying to make sure we’re keeping up with how music creators and our community are using technology. And in this case, AI-enhanced the record and allowed it to be eligible in the categories that it was eligible in,” Mason jr explains.
Dolly Parton scored her 55th career nomination in the audiobook, narration, and storytelling recording category for her “Behind the Seams: My Life in Rhinestones,” news The Associated Press broke to the country music legend Friday morning.
“No! What did I get nominated for?” she cheered over the phone. “Oh, well, that’s cool. I thought it would be for my rock album, I’d take it.
“It feels good. I’m always appreciative of everything. I don’t work for that, but it’s always good to say ‘You’ve done good work,’ and for somebody to acknowledge that. So, I’m always proud of every award I get and every mention I get. That just makes me feel like I’m doing the right thing.”
She’s up against producer Guy Oldfield, George Clinton, Barbra Streisand and Jimmy Carter, who could become the oldest Grammy award winner in history at 100.
So, what’s missing? Like last year, there’s a huge dearth of Latin music — the fastest-growing streaming genre in the United States — across the board, and no representation in the major categories.
There are also only four entries in the best Música Mexicana album category, despite it also being one of the fastest-growing genres.
And K-pop, too, seems to be absent. There are no nominations for the BTS members who’ve released solo material this year: RM’s “Right Place, Wrong Person,” J-Hope’s “Hope on the Street, Vol. 1,” and Jimin’s “Muse.” As a boy band, BTS has received five nominations across their career.
“I definitely see room for improvement across many genres and we are continuing to invite people to be a part of the academy,” Mason Jr. says.
“Without the right representation, we don’t get the right results. When I say right, I mean reflective and representative of what’s happening in music today. So, the work continues.”
Latest Stories
-
Today in History: Black Stars dominate Africa with 1963 AFCON win
14 mins -
Fiorentina v Inter suspended after Bove collapse
14 mins -
Ghana Athletics misses out on Member Federation of the Year as USA claims top prize
26 mins -
Hassan and Tebogo named World Athletes of the Year
29 mins -
MTN FA Cup Rnd 64: Hearts, Kotoko through to next stage, Samartex knocked out
33 mins -
Ex-NPP Chair for Ajumako Enyan Essiam crosses carpet to NDC, backs Ato Forson
39 mins -
Special voting for Western and Eastern postponed to Thursday over ballot leakage incident
53 mins -
Bawumia makes 2nd return to Ashanti Region as campaign hits final lap
1 hour -
Palmer stars as Chelsea brush aside Aston Villa
2 hours -
Manchester United thump Everton at Old Trafford
2 hours -
EC orders recall and reprinting of Eastern and Western ballot papers due to leakage
2 hours -
Keta Port Project to be commissioned soon!
4 hours -
Malaysia and Thailand flooding kills at least 12
4 hours -
Government reaffirms commitment to integrating innovative green solutions into infrastructure
4 hours -
GCEA 2024 Conference held with election of Kwabena Bempong as new president
4 hours