All About Jay-Z, the Artist With the Most Grammy Nominations in History

Rapper Jay-Z added three new nominations for the 2022 Grammy Awards gala , to be held on April 3 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, and became the most nominated musician in the history of these awards with 83 nominations , ahead of musical icons like Paul McCartney, with 81, and Quincy Jones, with 80.

What is striking is that Jay-Z did not release his own works in 2021 and his three nominations come from two collaborations that aspire to take the title of best rap song: “Bath Salt” with DMX and “Jail” with Kanye West.

In addition, Jay-Z could win a Grammy for album of the year because he is one of the composers of “Donda”, West’s album that competes in the star category of the awards.

Another curious fact is that just a year ago Beyonce , his wife, became one of the two women who won the most Grammy Awards in history, with 28 statuettes. The other is Alison Krauss, a bluegrass singer and violinist, also 28.

Jay-Z and Beyoncé married in 2008 and have three children. Each has an entity on its own, but together they make the richest and most powerful couple on the show.

Jay Z’s career

Although less well known than his wife, Jay-Z built a successful music career to become one of the most influential hip-hop songwriters of all time . Born in New York in 1969 as Shawn Corey Carter, in addition to being a rapper, he is a producer, businessman, and occasionally an actor.

Musically, he rose to fame in 1996 with his debut album Reasonable Doubt . That album, along with “The Blueprint” (2001) and “The Black Album” (2003) are considered milestones in hip-hop and are classified in the list of the 500 best albums of all time by Rolling Stone magazine, who it also rated him as the 88th best artist of the 100 greatest artists of all time.

His 2001 album “The Blueprint” was entered in March in the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress of the United States, for being considered “culturally, historically or aesthetically important”.

As of 2019, he was estimated to have sold 75 million albums worldwide . In addition, he holds the record for most number one albums by a solo artist on the Billboard 200 with 14, behind only The Beatles, who have 19. He is also the rapper with the most Grammy wins, with 23 statuettes.

Jay-Z beyond rap

As an entrepreneur and investor, he is co-owner of the 40/40 Club, one of the franchise owners of the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets, and the creator of the Rocawear clothing line. In addition, he was CEO of Def Jam Recordings, which has among its ranks artists like Kanye West, Rihanna or J. Cole.

He was recognized as the richest rapper in the world in an exclusive list created by Forbes magazine and it is estimated that his fortune exceeds 1,400 million dollars. The American magazine explains that Jay-Z was successful because he built brands instead of just endorsing them.

Examples of this are Roc-A-Fella Records , a record company he founded in 1995 with his friend Damon Dash because no label would hire him, the cognac he created ( D’Ussé ) and Tidal , a streaming music platform he bought in 2015 and sold in 2021 for $300 million.

Jay-Z’s tough adolescence

Before becoming a billionaire rapper, Jay-Z’s life was surrounded by violence and drugs . Shawn Carter was born and raised in Marcy Houses, a public housing project in Brooklyn, which in the 1980s was one of the most dangerous places in the United States.

When he was 11 years old, his uncle was murdered and his father abandoned the family after becoming addicted to drugs. When he was 12, and as he himself rapped in You must love me (1997), he shot his brother in the shoulder for stealing some jewelry.

In 2002, Jay-Z confessed to CBS that as a teenager he dealt crack cocaine . Then, in 2013 in an interview with Vanity Fair he gave more details: “Crack was everywhere, it was inevitable, there was no place you could go to isolate yourself from it.” In that interview he also left a revealing phrase: “I know a lot about budgets: I was a camel.”

The success did not prevent some violent episodes from continuing to take place in his life. In 1999 Carter, already a well-known rapper, was arrested by the police for stabbing a record executive in a New York club because he apparently suspected that he was handing out bootleg copies of his latest album.