Beyoncé leads 2025 Grammy nominees as Black Creoles with Catholic connections loom large

The 2025 Grammy nominations are in, courtesy of the Recording Academy and featuring a women’s moment, with Beyoncé among five nominated for all three major category awards.

The Houstonian crooner wowed critics and fans with her country-themed “Cowboy Carter” LP in March, which topped the charts and is now nominated for Album of the Year—despite receiving no nods at this year’s Country Music Awards.

In total, Beyoncé is up for a career-high 11 Grammys, including Song and Record of the Year (“Texas Hold ‘Em”), as well as the three major country music categories. As of Saturday, she has surpassed her husband Jay-Z for the most nominations in history with 99.

A fellow Catholic-connected Creole in Jon Batiste is also among this year’s nominees, marking the second such year in a row for the New Orleans native. His 2023 documentary film “American Symphony,” which has already seen success in the awards circuit, is up for Best Music Film as well as Best Song Written for Visual Media (“It Never Went Away,” which also garnered an Oscar nod).

Sheila E., the West Coast drummer of Black Creole and Latino descent, received nominations in two categories, for Best Global Music Performance (covering Celia Cruz’s megahit “Bemba Colorá” with Latin pop superstar Gloria Estefan and Mimy Succar) and Best Tropical Latin Album (“Bailar”).

Yet more Creoles (and Louisiana more generally) were once again well-represented in the Best Regional Roots Music Album category, where the state’s various Black-led, Catholic-infused folk genres have seen sustained success in recent Grammy slates. This year features two returnees from last year’s crop, The Rumble featuring Chief Joseph Boudreaux Jr. (“Stories From The Battlefield”) and New Breed Brass Band (“Live At The 2024 New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival”).

Also nominated are zydeco stalwarts Sean Ardoin And Kreole Rock And Soul (“25 Back To My Roots”) as well as Boudreaux’s father Big Chief Monk Boudreaux and nephew J’Wan Boudreaux. Like New Breed, the latter two artists, with the Golden Eagles Mardis Gras Indian tribe, were nominated for a live album at this year’s Jazz Fest.

“I'm super excited. Thank you to all my peers in the recording academy,” said Ardoin on social media. “I do not take this for granted... This is not easy. This is such a big honor.”

Competing against Batiste in the film category is the legendary rap group Run-DMC, as the subjects of the Kirk Fraser-directed docuseries “Kings from Queens.” Darryl “DMC” McDaniels, who makes up one-half of the remaining duo and co-produced the feature, was brought up Catholic in New York City.

On the international side, Canadian Catholic singer Deborah Cox was nominated for Best Musical Theater Album as part of the ensemble for the latest Broadway rendering of “The Wiz.” The timeless African-American-themed take on “The Wizard of Oz” originally took home the category's award in 1976.

“I’m so thrilled about the Grammy nomination announcement this morning," Cox posted online Saturday. “It was my intention to bring something new and fun to Glinda. Congratulations to Joseph Joubert, Allen Louis, and the amazing cast.”

The 82-year-old Brazilian Black Catholic singer and instrumentalist Milton Nascimento snagged a nomination for Best Jazz Vocal Album alongside Esperanza Spalding. Their eponymous collaboration was released in August, just ahead of the Grammy deadline.

Angélique Kidjo, the Beninese-French singer who has long noted her turn away from the Catholicism of her youth in favor of Voodoo, was nominated in the Best Global Music Performance category for a Christian-themed collaboration with the Soweto Gospel Choir (“Sunlight to My Soul”).

Outside of the music categories, Georgia native Omari Hardwick—a Catholic best known for his role on the popular Black TV show “Power”—was nominated for Best Spoken Word Poetry Album with his collaborative 2024 work “Concrete & Whiskey Act II Part 1: A Bourbon 30 Series.”

To catch all the winners at the ceremony, tune in to the live Grammys telecast on Sunday, Feb. 2, 2025, aired from Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on CBS. Streaming broadcasts will be available on CBS.com and Paramount+.

Nate Tinner-Williams is co-founder and editor of Black Catholic Messenger.

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