One frequent complaint about the Grammy Awards is that it’s a popularity contest. Another is that it’s a political affair, propelled by lobbying and behind-the-scenes influence. It’s also often said that Recording Academy voters act like the stewards of some kind of gated community: the rules, unspoken but widely understood, stipulate that once you’re in, you’re in.
In the strictest sense, none of these accusations are true. But you’d be forgiven for thinking otherwise after perusing the results in and around jazz at the 67th Grammy Awards. Every winning artist is richly deserving of their accolades, to be clear. It’s just that the pattern set this year points to a system faltering in all-too-predictable ways. And while the world’s attention falls on Beyoncé finally claiming Album of the Year — after a years-long and none-too-subtle public campaign of her own — it’s worth holding the jazz field to account. (To that end, hear this Grammy recap on The Late Set.)
Consider the following names: Chick Corea. Norah Jones. Jon Batiste. Samara Joy. All have been bountiful beneficiaries in Grammys past. (Heading into this year, Corea’s total put him within the top several winners of all time, behind only Beyoncé, orchestral conductor Georg Solti, and Quincy Jones.) Now consider that each of those aforementioned artists took home another Grammy or two this year, alongside other repeat winners, in the face of stiff competition.
Joy, a breakout Best New Artist winner in 2023, scored her fourth and fifth Grammys this year, both related to her Christmas album, A Joyful Holiday. First she shared Best Jazz Performance with pianist Sullivan Fortner for their version of Stevie Wonder’s “Twinkle Twinkle Little Me.” Then, A Joyful Holiday won Best Jazz Vocal Album — besting strong entries by Kurt Elling with Fortner; Milton Nascimento and esperanza spalding; Catherine Russell and Sean Mason; and Christie Dashiell.
When accepting the award, Joy was unfailingly gracious, thanking her fellow nominees and the broader musical community, along with those closest to her heart. “I want to shout out the McClendon Family, my family — Elder Goldwire and Ruth McClendon, the patriarch and matriarch of my family.” she said. “The Savettes of Philadelphia, they trickled all of this musical legacy down to my cousins and my aunts and uncles.” Joy added: “It means everything to be able to highlight what I come from, the stock that I come from, and who inspires me the most.”
Family was also a subtext of Corea’s posthumous win, in the category of Best Jazz Instrumental Album, for Remembrance, a duo effort with Béla Fleck. Walking to the winner’s podium shortly after performing his virtuoso solo banjo take on George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” — part of a project that had earned him multiple nominations this year, but not a win — Fleck brought his son, Juno, the namesake of one track on Remembrance.

Joining them onstage was Chick’s daughter, Liana Corea. “My father expressed a deep wish that his legacy continue, so he could keep inspiring others with his music. And this award today is helping him do this,” Liana said. In a shakier voice, she added: “And Dad, I just want to thank you again for your tireless passion and dedication to your music. I will never forget you. I will love you forever.”
This was a beautiful moment offset only by the cold logic of a zero-sum game. The most jaded critic of the Grammy Awards could scarcely do better than to script a scenario in which Corea, who died in 2021, is still racking up wins. (Maybe one better: The Beatles won Best Rock Performance for an AI-assisted seance of a song, “Now and Then,” which was also up for Record of the Year.) Corea’s posthumous win came at the expense of Fortner’s rightly heralded Solo Game; Owl Song, by Ambrose Akinmusire with Bill Frisell and Herlin Riley; Phoenix Reimagined (Live), by Lakecia Benjamin; and Beyond This Place, by Kenny Barron, a contemporary of Corea’s at 81, and an artist who has been nominated 14 times and never won.
Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album brought an upset this year, if only because the category was stacked with heavy hitters who stuck out: The Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, for And So It Goes; Orrin Evans & The Captain Black Big Band, for Walk A Mile In My Shoe; John Beasley & The Frankfurt Radio Big Band, for Returning To Forever; and Miguel Zenón, for Golden City. The award went instead to a dark horse — the Dan Pugach Big Band’s Bianca Reimagined: Music For Paws And Persistence. In his speech, Pugach thanked his wife and musical partner, Nicole Zuraitis, who pulled off a similar underdog win for Best Jazz Vocal Album last year.
Among the other returning winners were bassist and singer-songwriter Meshell Ndegeocello, who has now gone two-for-two in the new category of Best Alternative Jazz Album (and sported a tour hoodie for André 3000, a fellow nominee); and pianist Taylor Eigsti, whose Plot Armor won Best Contemporary Instrumental Album. (Accepting his award, Eigsti subtly reinforced the in-group effect: “It’s a massive honor to be recognized with Béla Fleck, Bill Frisell and two of my close friends, Mark Guiliana and Julian Lage, who played so beautifully on my album as well.”)

And when the vocal group säje won Best Arrangement, Instruments and Vocals, for a track with violinist Regina Carter, one of its members, Sara Gazarek — recently named a National Trustee of the Los Angeles Chapter of the Recording Academy — devoted her acceptance speech to acknowledgment of the city’s wildfire relief efforts. She added: “I want to take a second to acknowledge a very important composer and arranger, the great John Clayton, who lost his house in the fires in Altadena. He also lost the Grammy Award that he won in this category in 2007.”
Norah Jones, who has been a Grammy fixture since her initial five-award sweep in 2003, won this year in the Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album category, for Visions. (Her competition in the category included Gregory Porter, for Christmas Wish, and Cyrille Aimée, for À Fleur de Peau.) And Jon Batiste, a fellow Album of the Year alum who snagged five Grammys of his own in 2022, took home a couple for American Symphony, about his journey with his wife, Suleika Jaouad, throughout her battle with leukemia. In addition to Best Music Film, it earned Batiste and Dan Wilson the award for Best Song Written for Visual Media, for “It Never Went Away.”
In the category of Best Instrumental Composition, which could have gone to Corea and Fleck’s Remembrance,” the winner instead was “Strands,” composed by pianist Pascal Le Boeuf for the Akropolis Reed Quintet with drummer Christian Euman. “I like what Samara Joy said about recognizing people who inspire us,” Le Boeuf remarked as he accepted the award. “Ralph Ellison says at the end of Invisible Man something that resonated with me about how America is woven of many strands; let us recognize them. And in this project, in the music, it’s about recognizing Geri Allen, Charles Mingus, Dave Brubeck, and Leonard Bernstein.”
Best Latin Jazz Album was perhaps the single category where a younger, more adventurous option won out over established standard-bearers. It went to pianist Zaccai Curtis, for Cubop Lives! — a small-group Afro-Cuban album whose personnel includes his brother, bassist Luques Curtis.
Finally, the deluxe boxed set Centennial: King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band, which was featured prominently in our Holiday Gift Guide, won awards in each of its nominated categories. Its deeply researched booklet essay, by Ricky Riccardi, won Best Album Notes. And the box itself won Best Historical Recording.
Beyond the Grammys Premiere Ceremony, where most of the awards were announced, jazz also had a more pronounced presence than usual on the network broadcast — largely thanks to a centerpiece tribute to Quincy Jones, the ultimate jazz artist turned pop maverick. Herbie Hancock served as the musical through-line from his station at a Fazioli piano, accompanying Cynthia Erivo in a surefooted version of “Fly Me to the Moon,” and later joining Stevie Wonder for an articulate stroll through Toots Thielemans’ “Bluesette.”

Hancock, like Wonder, long ago became a Grammy legend emeritus: there are 39 wins and 108 nominations between them, and each has won Album of the Year. (They once shared in the same award: Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocals, for “St. Louis Blues,” from Hancock’s 1998 album Gershwin’s World.) But in this shared moment, and throughout their careers, these two masters gave the distinct impression that true musical exchange was a prize unto itself.
A previous version of this story misidentified the song that Cynthia Erivo sang with Herbie Hancock. It was “Fly Me to the Moon.”