The 68th Annual Grammy Awards: A Recap of The Biggest Music Award Show of the Year

By: Rylee Lyons

Last week, the 2026 Grammys highlighted some of the biggest moments in music from the past year. Hosted by Trevor Noah, the 68th Annual Grammy Awards featured a mix of musical performances, celebrity guests, red-carpet fashion, and a stacked lineup of award categories. While the entire night was packed with talent, most viewers awaited the announcement of the winners for the “Big Four” awards: Album of the Year, Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best New Artist. Here’s a look at some of the biggest winners from the night.

Album of the Year

Last week, the Album of the Year Award was given to Bad Bunny for Debí Tirar Más Fotos, which has charted number one globally on platforms such as Spotify and Billboard. This 2025 album was expected to win the award, as Bad Bunny is widely considered the biggest artist worldwide. According to newsroom.spotify.com Bad Bunny had 19.8 billion streams in 2025 and has 92.9 million monthly listeners. Bad Bunny also received two more grammy awards for Best Global Musical Performance and Best Música Urbana Album putting his career total at six. 

Record of the Year

The Record of the Year award focuses on elements such as performance, production, and sound engineering, and this year the award went to “luther” by Kendrick Lamar featuring SZA. This song spent 13 weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot 100, the longest out of any R&B/hip hop song to do so in the last decade. In their acceptance speech, Lamar and SZA expressed their gratitude to have the privilege to sample Luther Vandross and Cheryl Lynn’s song, “If This World Were Mine.” They said they wanted to make sure their interpretation of the song conveyed love and upheld the original record’s musicality.

Song of the Year

The Song of the Year award highlights the song’s artistry rather than its production, focusing on elements such as lyricism and melody. This year, the award went to “WILDFLOWER” by Billie Eilish. She accepted the award with her brother and producer, FINNEAS, and by doing so, they became the first to win the Song of the Year award three times.

Best New Artist

The 2026 Best New Artist award went to Olivia Dean. The 26-year-old British singer has hit countless milestones since her first album, Messy, was released in 2023. Her sophomore album, The Art of Loving, was recorded in a home in East London, where she lived while working on the project. After its release in 2025, it has received as much love as it embodied. Many consider her sound timeless, soulful, and intimate, as she exemplified in her Grammys performance of her hit single “Man I Need.” Dean ended her speech with an ode to her grandmother, who was an immigrant to the United States: “I want to say I’m up here as a granddaughter of an immigrant. I am a product of bravery, and I think those people deserve to be celebrated. We’re nothing without each other.”