Broadway Scores Second Consecutive Clean Sweep In Musical Theater Grammy Nominations
For the second consecutive year, Broadway cast albums made a clean sweep of the Grammy nominations for Best Musical Theater Album, shutting out both the West End and Off Broadway.
Competing for the 2023 Grammy will be Kimberly Akimbo, Parade, Shucked, Some Like It Hot and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. Three of the five nominees are new shows, while two – Parade and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street – are revivals.
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With today’s announcement, the Grammys reprise last summer’s Tony Awards, when all five of the productions made strong showing in both nominations and wins. At the Tonys, Kimberly Akimbo won top honors for Best Musical and Best Original Score, while Parade was named Best Musical Revival – three wins that might be most relevant as a Grammy predictor.
Still, the Tonys also awarded performances from Some Like It Hot (J. Harrison Ghee, Lead Actor) and Shucked (Alex Newell, Featured Actor) – Kimberly Akimbo‘s Victoria Clark and Bonnie Milligan took the Actress nominations in those categories – while Parade‘s Michael Arden was honored for his direction. David Lindsay-Abaire won Best Book for Kimberly Akimbo.
Like last year, all five of the nominees are Broadway cast albums, bucking a previous nomination trend that saw strong showings from both London, Off Broadway and even a concept album from a TikTok musical (the 2022 winner The Unofficial Bridgerton Musical).
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Even in years when the nominations are more representative of theater both Broadway and non-Broadway, the Grammy winner almost always is a Broadway cast album, Bridgerton being the notable exception. The 2023 winner was the revival of Into The Woods, which began life Off Broadway as an Encores! presentation but took the Grammy for the recording of its subsequent Broadway staging.
Also worth noting: Of the five 2024 nominees, one has already closed (the limited engagement of Parade starring Ben Platt and Micaela Diamond), two will definitely be closed by the time the winners are announced on Feb. 4 (Some Like It Hot, closing Dec. 30 and Shucked, closing Jan. 14); and one – Sweeney Todd – will have lost its original leads (the final performances of Josh Groban and Annaleigh Ashford are January 14; Aaron Tveit and Sutton Foster step in beginning February 9 for 12 weeks only).
The 2024 Best Musical Theater Album nominees, as listed by the Grammys, are:
Kimberly Akimbo – John Clancy, David Stone & Jeanine Tesori, producers; Jeanine Tesori, composer; David Lindsay-Abaire, lyricist (Original Broadway Cast)
Parade – Micaela Diamond, Alex Joseph Grayson, Jake Pedersen & Ben Platt, principal vocalists; Jason Robert Brown & Jeffrey Lesser, producers; Jason Robert Brown, composer & lyricist (2023 Broadway Cast)
Shucked – Brandy Clark, Jason Howland, Shane McAnally & Billy Jay Stein, producers; Brandy Clark & Shane McAnally, composers/lyricists (Original Broadway Cast)
Some Like It Hot – Christian Borle, J. Harrison Ghee, Adrianna Hicks & NaTasha Yvette Williams, principal vocalists; Mary-Mitchell Campbell, Bryan Carter, Scott M. Riesett, Charlie Rosen & Marc Shaiman, producers; Scott Wittman, lyricist; Marc Shaiman, composer & lyricist (Original Broadway Cast)
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street – Annaleigh Ashford & Josh Groban, principal vocalists; Thomas Kail & Alex Lacamoire, producers (Stephen Sondheim, composer & lyricist) (2023 Broadway Cast)
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