Will UCLA have a Grammy winner this weekend

With the 68th Grammy Award winners set to be crowned Sunday, Feb.1, at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, here's a look at the 2026 nominees who are faculty members or alumni of the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music.

Erik Madrid
The school of music faculty member was the recording engineer for an album - Ledisi's "The Crown" - nominated in two categories: best R&B album and best traditional R&B performance, for the song "Love You Too."

Este Haim
The ethnomusicology alumna was nominated for best rock album with "I Quit."

Michael Mayo
The UCLA Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz alumnus was nominated in two categories: His album "Fly" was nominated for best jazz vocal album, and his song "Four" was nominated for best jazz performance.

Alexander Lloyd Blake
The music school alum - and founder and artistic director of Tonality - was nominated in the category of best New Age-ambient or chant album for multiple appearances on "Nomadica," an album by Carla Patullo.

Jake Heggie and Brian Vu
The two alumni were nominated in the best opera recording category. Heggie received a nomination for his opera "Intelligence," recorded by the Houston Grand Opera; Vu was the featured tenor soloist on the opera "Huang Ruo: An American Soldier," recorded by the American Composers Orchestra.

Los Angeles Philharmonic
The Los Angeles Philharmonic was nominated in three categories - best choral performance and best classical compendium for Gabriela Ortiz's "Yanga" and best classical composition for Ortiz's "Dzonot". The recording featured several music school faculty: Boris Allakhverdyan (principal clarinet), Chris Hanulik (principal bass), Ben Hong (associate principal cello), Varty Manouelian (violin), James Miller (associate principal trombone), and alumni David Riccobono (assistant principal timpanist and section percussionist) and KT Somero (LA Phil librarian).