Beyoncé famously said on Instagram, “This ain’t a Country album. This is a ‘Beyoncé’ album.” But Grammy voters respectfully disagreed: In addition to its album of the year nod, Cowboy Carter is nominated for best country album, and in four other country or Americana categories. It’s the first country album to be nominated for album of the year since Kacey Musgraves’ Golden Hour, which won in 2019.
Eddy Arnold’s My World (1966) was the first country album to be nominated for album of the year. Glen Campbell’s By the Time I Get to Phoenix (1969) was the first country album to win in that category.
The Chicks have had three album of the year nominations, more than any other country act. Taylor Swift (in her country period) had two. Linda Ronstadt also had two, counting the Trio album, on which she collaborated with Dolly Parton and Emmylou Harris. Harris and Alison Krauss also had two, counting the O Brother, Where Art Thou? soundtrack, on which they both were featured.
We define a country album as any album that made Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart. That rather low threshold for what constitutes a country album brought in Lionel Richie’s Can’t Slow Down. The album peaked at No. 55 on Top Country Albums in 1984, but a subsequent Richie album, Tuskegee, spent four weeks at No. 1 on that chart.
Here are all the country albums that have received Grammy nominations for album of the year. They are shown in chronological order. The years shown are the years of the Grammy ceremonies.
