The Grammy eligibility period ended on Friday Sept. 15, two weeks earlier than usual. That means if a record isn’t out by now it can’t be considered for the 66th Annual Grammy Awards, which will be presented on Feb. 4, 2024 at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles.
The next public-facing step will be the announcement of the nominations on Nov. 10. We don’t know for sure who’s going to be nominated, but we have a pretty good idea of some artists who are likely to be nominated in the so-called Big Four categories (album, record and song of the year plus best new artist) – and what those nominations would mean in terms of Grammy history.
A few reminders first: It will be a little harder to crack the Big Four categories than it was the last two years: The Recording Academy is cutting the number of nominees in each of those categories from a bloated 10 to eight, which was the magic number from 2020-22. (Before that, it was generally five.)
This year’s eligibility period runs from Oct. 1, 2022 through Sept. 15. First-round voting extends from Oct. 11 – Oct. 20. Final-round voting extends from Dec. 14 to Jan. 4, 2024.
In a welcome change, the Academy reinstated a baseline of involvement needed to receive an album of the year nod. Credited and featured artists, songwriters, producers, engineers, mixers and mastering engineers must have worked on at least 20% of an album’s playing time to receive a nod. This is up from no baseline the last two years, when the Academy handed out nominations in this category like they were Halloween candy.
Here are 17 artists (and a soundtrack) who have a chance to make history when the nominations are announced. We also indicate how likely it is that this will happen.
