Stars are descending on LA for music’s biggest night: Here’s your Grammys guide

At the ripe old age of 67, the Grammy Awards are still considered "music's biggest night".

This year's ceremony takes place in LA on Sunday, with everyone from Harry Styles to Chaka Khan due to attend.

Kendrick Lamar tops the nominations with nine nods, most of them for his sixth album, GNX. He was the main winner at last year's ceremony, too, winning both record and song of the year for his scorching diss track, Not Like Us.

Other contenders include Lady Gaga, with seven nominations, along with Bad Bunny, Sabrina Carpenter and Leon Thomas, who have six each.

In total, there are 95 awards, distributed over a mind-boggling eight hours. Alongside banner categories like album of the year, we'll find out who had the best album artwork, and who's made the best "ambient, new age or chant" album.

Here's everything you need to know ahead of the ceremony.

Most insiders agree that there's a three-way race for the night's biggest prize - with Bad Bunny, Kendrick Lamar and Lady Gaga the presumed favourites.

None of them have ever won before, despite multiple nominations, and there are good reasons to think they're the front-runners.

Gaga is a Grammy darling, with 14 wins from 45 nominations. Her seventh album, Mayhem, is a triumphant return to the maximalist pop that made her famous, delivered with the hard-won grace of someone who's endured 18 years in the pop machine.

Like Beyoncé last year, voters might feel she's put in the work to earn the top title.

Lamar is in a similar position. He's the only artist with album of the year nominations for five consecutive releases, and GNX is a snappy, crowd-pleasing tour de force.

Giving him the prize would also go some way to correcting the Grammys' rap problem. The last time a hip-hop album won album of the year was in 2004.

But Bad Bunny is the presumptive front-runner. The Puerto Rican star's musically ambitious Debí Tirar Más Fotos, fuses live instrumentation with the hip-swaying pulse of reggaeton, plena, salsa and a multitude of other Latin styles.

A win for Bad Bunny would mark the first win for a Spanish language album.

That said, the Grammys have a habit of making spectacularly weird decisions, so don't discount the chances of Justin Bieber or Sabrina Carpenter lifting the trophy.

Notably, no matter who wins album of the year, it will be their first victory in the category.

Pop duo Milli Vanilli were stripped of their Grammy Award for best new artist in 1990, when it was discovered that the members, Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus, had been miming to someone else's vocals.

Thirty-six years later, Morvan is nominated for best audiobook for his memoir You Know It's True: The Real Story of Milli Vanilli.

It's an eye-opening and harrowing story that lays bare what fame demands of you, and how Morvan struggled to rebuild his life after becoming one of music's biggest punchlines.

If he wins, it could be an emotional moment of redemption.

The British star is certainly a front-runner. Her joyful, old-school pop songs were deservedly massive last year, pairing classic songcraft with an unabashedly romantic outlook.

Her album, The Art Of Loving, had a golden streak in December, just as voters were filling in their ballots, boosting her odds of victory.

It came out too late to be shortlisted for album of the year, though. She'll have to wait 12 months for that one.

Dean faces strong competition from fellow Brit Lola Young, whose cathartically confrontational single Messy was a breakout hit last year.

R&B artist Leon Thomas could also sneak off with the trophy. A former writer for Ariana Grande, SZA and Post Malone, he's the only best new artist nominee to pick up an album of the year nod, which suggests he's popular with voters.

The rest of the pack includes influencer-turned-pop star Addison Rae, influencer-turned-pop star Alex Warren, frenetic girl group Katseye, chiselled rock star Sombr and LA indie outfit The Marías.

For the second year in a row, all eight new artist nominees will perform during a special segment on Sunday night.

One of the year's most fiercely-contested categories is record of the year - better understood as "best single".

That's where you'll find Sabrina Carpenter's Manchild butting heads with Lady Gaga's Abracadabra and Chappell Roan's The Subway.

But none of them really captured the public imagination in the same way as Rosé and Bruno Mars's APT. A honking great crossover hit, it has exactly the sort of cross-generational appeal the Grammys loves.

The only serious competition is Kendrick and SZA's Luther, a sumptuous rap ballad that spent 13 weeks at number one in America last year.

If APT wins, it'll be a record-breaker twice over. Rosé will become the first K-pop artist to win a Grammy; and Mars will become the only artist to win record of the year four times. (Right now, he's tied with Paul Simon on three.)

The song of the year award - which recognises the songwriters - has almost exactly the same shortlist, with the addition of Golden, from the movie K-Pop Demon Hunters.

The prominent use of samples and interpolations in Luther and APT could put them at a disadvantage here; which is good news for Carpenter's Manchild - whose country-pop hybrid appeals to a broad cross-section of voters.

Bad Bunny could also win here for DTMF (I should have taken more photos), a gorgeous rumination on the passage of time that segues into a lively celebration of life.

Heck, yeah. And what a list...

Not on your nelly.

Rumours that Taylor Swift would turn up and tinkle the ivories were shot down by Grammy producer Ben Winston.

Asked about the speculation by the showbiz website Hits Daily Double, he pointed out that the source of the story was... er, the showbiz website Hits Daily Double.

"The only reason people think Taylor might be performing or coming is because Hits decided to print it this week and it was picked up globally," he said.

But Hits just totally made that up. And now I am getting asked about it by you, as if it's a real thing, when it was made up in your office!

Also not performing: Bad Bunny. His gig headlining the Super Bowl half time show next month means he's unable to take the stage at the Grammys.

Right now, no K-pop artist has ever won a Grammy - although BTS have received multiple nominations and even performed at the ceremony.

That could change on Sunday. Rosé, one quarter of the South Korean girl group Blackpink, is nominated for three awards for APT, her irresistible, cheerleader chanting duet with Bruno Mars.

In the song of the year, she goes head-to-head with the fictional girl group Huntr/x, who appear in the hit animation K-Pop Demon Hunters.

And Katseye, a global girl group trained under the arduous K-pop system, are also up for best group and best pop group performance, for their single Gabriela.

They might not win, but there's a growing recognition that K-pop has become a cultural and commercial force.

For Audrey Nuna, one of the singers behind Huntr/x, getting to perform at the show represents a huge step forward.

You're going to see three Korean faces," she told E! News. "To think about the kids who are going to see that, and hopefully for that to shape their understanding of what they can do in this world, is the stuff that is giving me chills up my spine.

In an interview earlier this week, the Recording Academy CEO, Harvey Mason Jr, confirmed there was a "groundswell" amongst voters for a separate K-pop category.

Could it be created just in time for BTS's comeback? Watch this space.

Barbra Streisand could correct a historic wrong on Sunday night. Her duets album, The Secret of Life, is nominated for best traditional pop album - a category she has lost 13 times since it was introduced in 1992.

Her chances look slim, though, with stronger albums by Lady Gaga, Elton John & Brandi Carlile, and Icelandic jazz singer Laufey all in the running.

Festival headliners and generally excellent people Haim could become the first ever all-female band to win best rock album.

We really set out to make a rock album this time, so it's a huge milestone," Alana Haim told the BBC after their nomination. "But we're just grateful for the women that came before us.

Wicked may have been snubbed at this week's Bafta nominations, but the cast are up for four Grammys - including best duet, for Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande's rendition of Defying Gravity.

Elsewhere, the Dalai Lama is nominated for best audio book, for Meditations: The Reflections Of His Holiness The Dalai Lama. It's the first time a Dalai Lama has received a Grammy nomination.

Meanwhile, Nigerian Afrobeat star Fela Kuti will posthumously receive a Lifetime Achievement Award.

And we could end the night with the youngest-ever Grammy winner.

Eight year old Aura V is nominated for best children's album for Harmony, a bubbly, life-affirming record she made with her dad, Harold Simmons II.

In the week that Bruce Springsteen released a song denouncing "King Trump" and "federal thugs" in Minneapolis, it seems impossible that politics won't feature on the Grammys stage.

Billie Eilish, nominated for record and song of the year, has called on her fellow musicians to "speak up" about the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers, whose actions have resulted in the death of two protestors.

Bad Bunny didn't need prompting. He previously called ICE agents "sons of bitches" who won't leave "people alone and working".

President Trump has defended the immigration operation in Minnesota, saying it took "thousands of hardened criminals" out of the state. On Wednesday, however, he said his administration would "de-escalate a little bit", amid rising tensions.

Grammys boss Harvey Mason Jr said it was inevitable that emotions would spill onto the stage this Sunday.

You're going to hear and feel what's going on in the world through the music," he told CNN. "Maybe some people will choose to speak out about it, but you're definitely going to feel it in the music, in the performance, in the passion that goes into the art.

This year, about 15,000 people were eligible to vote for the Grammys - including musicians, producers, lyricists, and even the people who write album liner notes.

To qualify, they must be currently working in the music industry, and pay an annual subscription of $150 (£120) to the Recording Academy. All former winners are also eligible to vote.

Every member is allowed to vote in up to 10 categories across three fields, such as rock, classical and R&B. They are encouraged only to vote in genres where their expertise lies.

Additionally, every member, regardless of their background, gets to vote for the six biggest awards of the night. Those are: Album of the year, record of the year, song of the year, best new artist, songwriter of the year and producer of the year.

The 2026 awards recognise music released between 31 August, 2024 and 30 August, 2025.

More than 20,000 records were submitted for consideration this year. The winners will not be revealed until the ceremony.

The ceremony is split into two parts, with the first 80 awards distributed during what's called the "premiere ceremony" at 12:30 in Los Angeles / 20:30 in London on Sunday.

It's often worth tuning in. The winners in the more obscure categories are less polished and more excited about winning, and the performances are looser and, dare I say it, more musical than the grandiose set pieces you'll see later.

It's also the place to see British stars like Wet Leg, Yungblud, FKA Twigs and Sleep Token find out whether they've won in the rock and dance categories.

You can watch it all go down on the Recording Academy's YouTube channel, and on live.grammy.com.

That's also where you want to go to watch red carpet coverage, which kicks off at 15:00 in Los Angeles / 23:00 in the UK.

Finally, the main show kicks off at 17:00 Los Angeles / 01:00 Monday in the UK. It's broadcast live in the US on CBS and streaming platform Paramount Plus.

At present, there is no way to watch in the UK without circumventing geographical streaming restrictions, but clips from the ceremony appear on social media with incredible speed.

Full speeches and select performances are usually uploaded to YouTube the following day.

Source: BBC
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