Grammy Award for Song of the Year
The Grammy Award for Song of the Year is an honor presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards.[1] The Song of the Year award is one of the four most prestigious categories at the awards (alongside Best New Artist, Record of the Year and Album of the Year), presented annually since the 1st Grammy Awards in 1959. According to the 54th Grammy Awards description guide, the award is presented:
Grammy Award for Song of the Year
Quality song containing both lyrics and melody
United States
1959
If a winning song contains samples or interpolations of existing material, the publisher and songwriter(s) of the original song(s) can apply for a Winners Certificate.[3]
Song of the Year is related to but is conceptually different from Record of the Year or Album of the Year:
History and description[edit]
The Song of the Year awards have been awarded since 1959.[4] It is one of the four most prestigious Grammy Awards. Despite both the Record of the Year award and Song of the Year being awarded for a single or for one track from an album, this award goes only to the composer(s) of the song whereas the Record of the Year award goes to the performer(s) and production team for a particular recording of the song. According to the 54th Grammy Awards description guide, the award is given to the songwriter(s) of a song that "must contain melody and lyrics and must be either a new song or a song first achieving prominence during the eligibility year. Songs containing prominent samples or interpolations are not eligible".[5]
The award has not always been restricted to new or newly prominent songs; for instance, in 1992, when the winner was Natalie Cole's cover of "Unforgettable" (a song that had first been recorded by Nat King Cole and achieved prominence in the 1950s), the rule was merely that the song had to have been recorded during the eligibility year and not previously nominated for the award.[6]
Since the late 1960s other songwriter's awards have been presented for genre-specific categories, including Grammy Award for Best Country Song (since 1965), Grammy Award for Best R&B Song (since 1969), Grammy Award for Best Song Written for Visual Media (since 1988), Grammy Award for Best Rock Song (since 1992), and most recently Grammy Award for Best Rap Song (since 2004), Grammy Award for Best Gospel Song (from 2006 to 2014), Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Christian Music Song (from 2012 to 2014), Grammy Award for Best American Roots Song (since 2014), Grammy Award for Best Gospel Performance/Song (since 2015), and Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance/Song (since 2015).
The category was expanded to include eight nominees in 2019 and 10 nominees in 2022.[7] The number of nominees was reverted to eight starting with the 2024 ceremony.[8]
As of 2023, a distinct category to honor songwriters was established: Songwriter of the Year, Non-Classical.
Achievements[edit]
In many cases, the songwriters were also the performers (Domenico Modugno, Henry Mancini, John Lennon & Paul McCartney, Joe South, Paul Simon, Carole King, Barbra Streisand, Billy Joel, Michael McDonald, Christopher Cross, Sting, Michael Jackson & Lionel Richie, Bobby McFerrin, Eric Clapton, Bruce Springsteen, Seal, Shawn Colvin, Rob Thomas, U2, Alicia Keys, Luther Vandross, John Mayer, Dixie Chicks, Amy Winehouse, Coldplay, Beyoncé, Lady Antebellum, Adele, Fun, Lorde, Sam Smith, Ed Sheeran, Bruno Mars, Childish Gambino, Billie Eilish, H.E.R., Anderson .Paak, and Bonnie Raitt).
Dernst Emile II is the only songwriter to win Song of the Year in two consecutive years: in 2021 ("I Can't Breathe") and 2022 ("Leave the Door Open").
Other multiple winners in this category include Henry Mancini ("Moon River" and "Days of Wine and Roses"); Johnny Mercer ("Moon River" and "Days of Wine and Roses"); James Horner ("Somewhere Out There" and "My Heart Will Go On"); Will Jennings ("Tears in Heaven" and "My Heart Will Go On"); U2 ("Beautiful Day" and "Sometimes You Can't Make It on Your Own"); Adele ("Rolling in the Deep" and "Hello"); Christopher Brody Brown ("That's What I Like" and "Leave the Door Open"); Bruno Mars ("That's What I Like" and "Leave the Door Open"); Billie Eilish ("Bad Guy" and "What Was I Made For?"); and Finneas O'Connell ("Bad Guy" and "What Was I Made For?"), winning two times each.[9] However, songs written for Andy Williams, Roberta Flack, Barbra Streisand and Bette Midler have received this award twice.
American singer/songwriter Taylor Swift is the most nominated songwriter in this category with seven nominations. Swift has never won the award.[10]
The first woman to win the award was Carole King in 1972, for "You've Got a Friend".[11] Adele was the first female songwriter to win the award twice, winning for "Rolling in the Deep" and "Hello".[12]
Lorde is the youngest songwriter to win in the category, winning for "Royals" in 2014 at the age of 17.
Irving Gordon is the oldest songwriter to win the award, winning for "Unforgettable" in 1992 at age 77.
Christopher Cross and Billie Eilish are the only artists to receive the Grammys for Song of the Year as well as Record of the Year, Album of the Year, and Best New Artist in a single ceremony. Adele was the first artist to win the award for Song of the Year, Record of the Year, Album of the Year, and Best New Artist from separate occasions, and first woman to accomplish this feat. Only six artists have won the Song of the Year and Best New Artist awards the same year: Christopher Cross ("Sailing" in 1981), Alicia Keys ("Fallin'" in 2002), Amy Winehouse ("Rehab" in 2008), Fun ("We Are Young" in 2013), Sam Smith ("Stay with Me (Darkchild Version)" in 2015) and Billie Eilish ("Bad Guy" in 2020); Marvin Hamlisch is the only composer to win the Song of the Year and Best New Artist awards the same year in 1975, for "The Way We Were".
John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Lionel Richie, Diane Warren, Billie Eilish, H.E.R, and Finneas O'Connell are the only songwriters to receive three consecutive nominations for Song of the Year.
The song "Nel blu, dipinto di blu (Volare)", winner in 1959, written by Domenico Modugno and performed in Italian, is the only foreign-language song to win this award,[13] although the 1967 winner "Michelle" penned by Lennon–McCartney for The Beatles to perform, has a critical part of its lyrics in French.[14]
The Ernest Gold song "Theme of Exodus", which won in 1961, is the only instrumental song to ever receive this award.[15]
The first and only tie in this category in Grammy history took place in 1978, when both Barbra Streisand's & Paul Williams' "Evergreen (Love Theme from A Star Is Born)" and Joe Brooks' "You Light Up My Life" won the award.[16]
The first time in Grammy history that two different songs with the same title have been nominated in this category happened with "Hello" written by Lionel Richie in 1985 and "Hello" by Adele & Greg Kurstin in 2017.[17]
The song with the most writers to win this award is "That's What I Like", which won in 2018 with eight writers. The song with the most writers nominated in this category is "Peaches", which had 11 co-writers nominated for the 2022 ceremony.[18]
Thirty-two of the winning songs have also won the award for Record of the Year.
Process[edit]
From 1995 to 2018, members of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences nominated their choices for song of the year. A list of the top twenty records was given to the Nominations Review Committee, a specially selected group of anonymous members, who then selected the top five records to gain a nomination in the category in a special ballot.[19] The rest of the members then vote a winner from the five nominees.[20] In 2018, it was announced the number of nominated tracks would be increased to eight.[21] In 2021, it was announced that the Nomination Review Committees would be disbanded, and the final nominees for song of the year would be decided by votes from members.[22] Starting in 2022, the number of nominees in the category increased to 10.[23] However, the decision to expand the number of nominees in this category was made 24 hours before the nominees were announced after an early version of the nominations list had already been circulated. This allowed "Kiss Me More" by Doja Cat featuring SZA and "Right on Time" by Brandi Carlile to be nominated as they were the songs that received the most votes besides the other eight nominees.[24] As of the 2024 ceremony, the number of nominees has been reduced back to eight.[25]