‘Maybe Happy Ending,’ ‘Buena Vista Social Club,’ ‘Just in Time’ & More 2026 Grammy Front-Runners for Best Musical Theater Album

Maybe Happy Ending had a big night at the Tony Awards in June, winning six awards (more than any other show this year), including best musical and best original score. The show’s stars, Darren Criss and Helen J. Shen, performed “Chasing Fireflies” and “Never Fly Away” on the telecast. Will that translate into a Grammy win for best musical theater album when the 68th annual Grammy Awards are presented on Feb. 1?

If the album wins, Criss, who won a Tony for best lead actor in a musical, will be three-quarters of his way to an EGOT. He won a Primetime Emmy in 2018 for outstanding lead actor in a limited or anthology series or movie for playing spree killer Andrew Cunanan in The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story. (That’s what you call range.) Criss would share the Grammy for Maybe Happy Ending with Hue Park and Will Aronson, who collaborated on the score.

First, Maybe Happy Ending must be nominated. Grammy nominations will be announced on Nov. 7. The field, as always in this category, is packed with cast albums from both new shows and revivals; from Broadway, off-Broadway and London’s West End, in addition to some studio cast recordings.

Buena Vista Social Club and Death Becomes Her, which tied with Maybe Happy Ending for the most Tony nominations of any shows this year (10), are also likely to be nominated. All three shows are still running on Broadway.

Buena Vista Social Club features music by Buena Vista Social Club, whose landmark 1997 album of the same name won a Grammy for best traditional tropical Latin album and a Billboard Latin Music Award for tropical/salsa album of the year by a group. In 2022, the album was voted into the National Recording Registry. Two years later it was voted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. The Buena Vista Social Club ensemble performed “Candela” on the Tony telecast.

Death Becomes Her star Megan Hilty performed the entertaining “For the Gaze” on the telecast. Noel Carey and Julia Mattison collaborated on the score.

Sunset Blvd: The Album is also a strong contender. The revival of the show by composer Andrew Lloyd Webber won three Tonys, including one for Nicole Scherzinger, who managed to beat the all-time Tony winner, Audra McDonald, for best lead actress in a musical. Scherzinger, who had a series of hits with The Pussycat Dolls, sang the show’s most prized song, “As If We Never Said Goodbye,” on the telecast. The album from the original production, starring Glenn Close, was nominated in this category in 1995, but lost to the album from Stephen Sondheim’s Passion.

Just in Time is based on the life of the late, great Bobby Darin, who won the first Grammy ever awarded for best new artist and just the second ever awarded for record of the year, for the still-thrilling “Mack the Knife.” Jonathan Groff, who received a Tony nod for playing Darin, performed “Mack the Knife,” “That’s All” and “Once in a Lifetime” on the Tonys. The show is still running. Playbill reports that it is playing to 102.81% of capacity, which I guess means standing room only. (I’d stand for that.)

That’s five albums, the usual number of nominees in this category, but there are many more albums on the entry list that could move up if any of these presumed front-runners falter. David Foster, a 16-time Grammy winner, was the composer of Boop! The Musical, with lyrics by Susan Birkenhead. While the show went 0-3 at the Tonys, and didn’t land a coveted performance on the telecast, Foster’s stature in the music world could carry it to a nomination here.

Gypsy would set a Grammy record if it’s nominated, becoming the first show to spawn five nominated albums in this category. (The album from the original production starring Ethel Merman won in 1960, a revival starring Tyne Daly was nominated in 1991, a revival starring Bernadette Peters won in 2004 and a revival starring Patti LuPone was nominated in 2009.) Right now, Gypsy is tied with West Side Story, Into the Woods and Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street with four nominated albums each. It’s never a good idea to bet against Gypsy, but this revival went 0-5 at the Tonys, and McDonald’s performance of “Rose’s Turn” on the telecast was uncharacteristically histrionic.

Three more shows landed performance slots on the Tony telecast, which could help them land nominations here. (We presume that virtually everyone voting in this category watched the Tonys.) Those three shows are Dead Outlaw (the ensemble performed “Ballad” and “Dead”), Floyd Collins (the ensemble performed “The Ballad of Floyd Collins” and “The Call”), and Real Women Have Curves (the ensemble performed “Jugglin’”). Joy Huerta of the popular Mexican pop duo Jesse and Joy co-wrote the songs for the latter show with Benjamin Velez.

Scott Wittman and Marc Shaiman, who have won twice in this category (for Hairspray and Some Like It Hot) are entered for the musical adaptation of Smash (which went 0-2 at the Tonys).

Hadestown won in this category in 2020. The show is still running on Broadway. That could boost Hadestown: Live From London by the original West End company.

Lin-Manuel Miranda is Broadway royalty, which could lift Warriors (which he co-wrote with Elsa Dvais) to a nomination. Warriors is a concept album, inspired by the 1979 action film The Warriors. It features a diverse group of artists, including hip-hop stars Lauryn Hill, Busta Rhymes, Ghostface Killah and RZA, as well as Latin musician Marc Anthony and dancehall singer Shenseea. The album was conceived as a standalone musical work, but following its release, Miranda and Davis confirmed plans to develop a stage adaptation.

Several other albums by people with strong ties to the music industry will also likely get a look, including F**k 7th Grade (music and lyrics by the late Jill Sobule, who died in May), London Tide (PJ Harvey, credited as Polly Jean Harvey, and Ben Power), Saturday Church (Sia, credited as Sia Furler) and Swept Away (The Avett Brothers, credited as Scott Avett & Seth Avett).

The entry list consists of 58 albums. Here’s the Recording Academy’s explanation of who is eligible in this category: “For albums containing greater than 51% playing time of new recordings. Award to the principal vocalist(s), and the album producer(s) of 50% or more playing time of the album. The lyricist(s) and composer(s) of 50% or more of a score of a new recording are eligible for an award if any previous recording of said score has not been nominated in this category.”