Kenya will not be getting to host the Grammys, or the ‘African Grammys’, despite the excitement generated by President William Ruto’s earlier declarations that the country was on course to host an African edition of the prestigious music awards during a townhall in December of 2024.
Rather than a confirmed hosting deal, what is emerging is a longer-term relationship between Kenya’s music industry and the US-based Recording Academy, the organisation behind the Grammys.
And according to senior Recording Academy officials, who were part of the US delegation in the The AmCham Business Summit 2026 which took place on September 9–10, 2026, in Nairobi, that relationship is still in its early stages.
Panos Panay, the Recording Academy’s president, said the organisation has been deliberately laying the groundwork for a stronger presence in Africa rather than rushing to establish a separate African Grammys. Panos was speaking at a fireside panel event at Tribe Hotel on September 11, 2026, where he was also joined by Latin Grammys CEO Manuel Abud, Invention Studios president Nicky Weinstock, and US Embassy’s deputy chief of missions Carla Benini, and Hustlesasa co-founder Peng Chen.
Panos Panay, the Recording Academy’s president (centre), joined by Latin Grammys CEO Manuel Abud (right), and Invention Studios president Nicky Weinstock (second left) musician Ssaru (second right) with students from the US Embassy-funded English Access Scholarship Programme rappers Roddy Chynx (in red t-shirt) and Kixx760 (in black t-shirt) when the three paid a visit to the programme at Baraza Media Lab on September 10, 2026 as part of the AmCham delegation from the US.
Photo credit: Thomas Rajula | Nation
The Grammys president said the first major step in honouring the growth of African music was the creation, four years ago, of the Best African Music Performance category at the Grammys four years ago.
The category was followed by the American Music Mentorship Programme (AMMP), a partnership between the Recording Academy and the US State Department that has been supporting to support mid-career music industry professionals – including producers, managers, and promoters – from Africa. Implemented by Found Sound Nation, Kenya has been included in multiple cohorts, sending local music executives and behind-the-scenes professionals for specialised training and US residencies.
This year’s cohort, that leaves next month for the US, will include: music publicist and curator Anyiko Owoko, singer-songwriter and producer Karun, intellectual property lawyer and co-founder at African Womens' Orchestra - Wandiri Karimi, musician and English Access Scholarship Program programme director Anto Neosoul, among others.
The Academy has also been working on another crucial piece of the puzzle: getting more African music professionals into its membership.
“We are recruiting more and more members from the Kenyan music community as well as the broader African music community to become voting members in the Recording Academy,” Panos said.
That matters because the Grammys are decided by music professionals themselves rather than a traditional judging panel.
“It’s a peer-to-peer voted honour,” he added, explaining that the Academy has about 15,000 creators participating in its voting process.
For Kenya and the wider continent, increasing African representation within that voting body could ultimately have a bigger impact than simply creating a category reserved for African music.
Panos pointed to the historic victory of Puerto Rican singer Bad Bunny, whose album became the first non-English-language album to win the Grammy for Album of the Year, as an example of how changes in the Academy’s membership can influence the awards.
His ambition, he said, goes beyond seeing African musicians compete successfully in the Best African Music Performance category.
“Nothing would please me more than having a Kenyan artiste singing in Swahili winning Album of the Year,” he said.
That ambition, however, is some distance from establishing a separate African Grammy awards ceremony.
The creation of the Latin Grammys, first held in 2000, was not an overnight decision. Latin music first had to establish a significant presence in the US, the world's largest music market, over several decades before a separate academy and awards structure emerged. Latin Grammys CEO, Manuel said the story of Latin music's global rise can be traced back to the 1950s and 1960s, when Latin American and Caribbean communities in the US helped introduce their sounds and rhythms to a wider audience.
At first, established American musicians were adapting Latin music, with songs such as Consuelo Velázquez's “Bésame Mucho” and Antonio Carlos Jobim's “The Girl from Ipanema” becoming international hits.
The breakthrough then evolved through the 1980s and 1990s, as Latin artistes increasingly recorded in English to reach the US market. Artistes such as Gloria Estefan and Ricky Martin helped drive that crossover, while Shakira also initially built her international audience through English-language music.
It was only much later that Spanish-language music began breaking through at an unprecedented scale. Manuel pointed to “Despacito” as a watershed moment — a Spanish-language song that demonstrated the potential for music in the language to dominate the global market without first having to cross over into English.
The point, Abud said, is that the Latin music phenomenon did not emerge because an awards body decided to create a Latin Grammys. The music, audiences, artistes and industry had been developing for decades before the institution followed.
That history offers a sobering perspective for those expecting an African Grammys in the immediate future.
“For us, this commitment is longer term,” Panos said. “We all share this big vision, but we're starting with these first steps.”
The Recording Academy is planning commercial activations in Kenya around the period when the country hosts the Africa Cup of Nations, with the intention of bringing Grammy-branded experiences to the country.
“That’s important because it is a time when most of the world’s attention will be looking at Kenya as a place that’s hosting one of the biggest sporting tournaments on the planet, while that you look at Kenya as also welcoming the most important brand in music as a curator of amazing experiences here.
The Academy also expects to continue its mentorship initiatives and increase the number of Kenyan music professionals participating in its membership and voting processes. Panos, Nicky and Manuel had even made a visit to English Access Scholarship Programme funded by the US Embassy in Kenya where they met 25 emerging Kenyan artistes, musicians, and producers, and OneRPM artistes including Ssaru and Genes1s.
Panos said the Recording Academy's current engagement with Kenya should therefore be viewed as the beginning of a longer process rather than preparation for an imminent awards ceremony.
“I know everyone is impatient, but it’s a journey to have something take hold and it’s not a one-off. If all it takes is just the two of us coming here and just having these meetings, that’s not good enough,” he said, adding that it’s like gardening; it needs conditions, persistence, pruning, things that work and some which may not in order to create something that lasts.
The Academy's immediate timeline runs into the next year, not towards an African Grammys ceremony, but towards building those relationships and programmes. In other words, Kenya may be laying the groundwork for something that could eventually become much bigger, but there is currently no timeline for a separate African Grammys.
And if the Latin experience is any indication, the journey from a growing music movement to an institution capable of sustaining its own global awards may take considerably longer than a few years or proclamations.
