Grammy Award for Best Melodic Rap Performance


The Grammy Award for Best Melodic Rap Performance is an honor presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to recording artists for quality songs on which have both rapped and sung vocals. Honors in several categories are presented at the ceremony annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to "honor artistic achievement, technical proficiency and overall excellence in the recording industry, without regard to album sales or chart position".
The name and definition of the category were changed in June 2020, with immediate effect, to represent the inclusivity of the growing hybrid performance trends within the rap genre. According to the Recording Academy, "This category is intended to recognize solo and collaborative performances containing elements of rap and melody over modern production. This performance requires a strong and clear presence of melody combined with rap cadence, and is inclusive of dialects, lyrics or performance elements from non-rap genres including R&B, rock, country, electronic or more. The production may include traditional elements of rap or elements characteristic of the aforementioned non-rap genres."
The award goes to the artist. The producer, engineer and songwriter can apply for a Winners Certificate.
American rapper Eve and American singer Gwen Stefani won the first award in 2002 with "Let Me Blow Ya Mind". The pair were also nominated a second time in 2006 for "Rich Girl". American rapper Jay-Z has received seven Grammys in the category— four times as lead artist and three times as featured artist; he has also been nominated for three other songs. Rihanna is the female artist with the most wins in the category, with five wins out of nine total nominations.

Recipients

YearPerforming artistWorkNomineesRef.
2002Eve featuring Gwen Stefani"Let Me Blow Ya Mind"
2003Nelly featuring Kelly Rowland"Dilemma"
2004Beyoncé featuring Jay-Z"Crazy in Love"
2005Usher featuring Ludacris and Lil Jon"Yeah!"
2006Linkin Park and Jay-Z"Numb/Encore"
2007 featuring T.I."My Love"
2008Rihanna featuring Jay-Z"Umbrella"
2009Estelle featuring Kanye West"American Boy"
2010Jay-Z featuring Rihanna and Kanye West"Run This Town"
2011Jay-Z featuring Alicia Keys"Empire State of Mind"
2012Kanye West, Rihanna, Kid Cudi and Fergie"All of the Lights"
2013Jay-Z, Kanye West, Frank Ocean and The-Dream"No Church in the Wild"
2014Jay-Z and Justin Timberlake"Holy Grail"
2015Eminem featuring Rihanna"The Monster"
2016Kendrick Lamar featuring Bilal, Anna Wise & Thundercat"These Walls"
2017Drake"Hotline Bling"
2018Kendrick Lamar featuring Rihanna"Loyalty"
2019Childish Gambino"This Is America"
2020DJ Khaled featuring Nipsey Hussle and John Legend"Higher"
2021Anderson.Paak"Lockdown"
2022Kanye West featuring The Weeknd and Lil Baby"Hurricane"
2023Future featuring Drake and Tems"Wait for U"
2024Lil Durk featuring J. Cole"All My Life"
2025Rapsody featuring Erykah Badu"3:AM"
2026

Each year is linked to the article about the Grammy Awards held that year.

Artists with multiple wins

;7 wins
  • Jay-Z
;5 wins
  • Rihanna
  • Kanye West
;2 wins
  • Kendrick Lamar
  • Justin Timberlake
  • Drake

    Artists with multiple nominations

;15 nominations
  • Kanye West
;12 nominations
  • Jay-Z
;9 nominations
  • Drake
  • Rihanna
  • Beyoncé
;7 nominations
  • Kendrick Lamar
  • John Legend
;5 nominations
;4 nominations
;3 nominations
;2 nominations