A class act. Earlier in the month, the Recording Academy announced the full list of nominees for the 68th annual Grammy Awards, which takes place on Sunday, February 1st, 2026, at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles. While country music was shockingly completely absent from any and all all-genre categories, such as Best New Artist, Song, Record and Album of the Year, there was undoubtedly a lot of excitement within the alternative/traditional country scene, given that the brand-new Best Traditional Country Album category was up for grabs for the first time in Grammy history. In case you missed it, back in June, the Recording Academy announced that for the first time ever, they will be adding a fifth and final country category in the form of Best Traditional Country Album. This, of course, came shortly after Beyoncé shocked the world and took home Best Country Album for her highly controversial COWBOY CARTER album. Despite many reports claiming that the Recording Academy intentionally added the Traditional Country category in direct response to the controversy of Beyoncé’s win this past February, Harvey Mason Jr., the Recording Academy CEO, noted that many prominent members of the alternative country community had been pushing for the creation of the category for years. “The community of people that are making country music in all different subgenres came to us with a proposal and said we would like to have more variety in how our music is honored. They said, we think we need more space for our music to be celebrated and honored.” He’d also add that he wanted to level the playing field for the genre, noting that he wanted the category to reflect the diversity that’s currently in country music today. “It makes country parallel with what’s happening in other genres, but it is also creating space for where this genre is going.” On November 7th, the first official nominees for Best Traditional Country Album were revealed, and they were nothing short of stacked with Charley Crockett’s Dollar A Day, Margo Price’s Hard Headed Woman, Zach Top’s Ain’t In It For My Health, Lukas Nelson’s American Romance and his father, Willie Nelson’s, Oh What A Beautiful World all receiving nominations. Of course, it’s incredible to see the likes of Crockett, both Willie and Lukas Nelson (who became just the second father-son duo in history to be nominated in the same category for different albums) and Top all receive recognition for their stellar work. However, there was one glaring problem with the nominations: the lack of the Turnpike Troubadours. Ever since the Best Traditional Country Album category was announced, the general consensus among fans and critics alike was that the award was all but a guarantee for bands such as Turnpike to receive a nomination. Despite releasing what many (myself included) recognized as one of the best albums of the year with April’s The Price of Admission, unfortunately, the Red Dirt legends were shut out of the Grammys once again this year. Unsurprisingly, Turnpike fans were quite upset about the obvious snub. With that being said, however, no one was quite as upset as Crockett himself. Taking to Instagram Sunday afternoon, Crockett posted an image of himself and Turnpike’s frontman, Evan Felker, side by side with text detailing how Felker helped him get his start in the industry after the “Man from Waco” singer unknowingly gave him one of his early CDs outside Gruene Hall in New Braunfels, Texas. “I was standing out at Gruene Hall handing out CDs on a street corner ’cause I couldn’t get into the show. Handed a guy a CD, his name was Evan Felker. I didn’t know who he was at the time, but he was the frontman for the Turnpike Troubadours. He took it home and listened to it with his then girlfriend, now wife. Lo and behold, his agent Jon Folk called me up and started booking me.” View this post on Instagram Crockett would take the post one step further in the caption, however. Not only would Crockett praise Felker and Co. for the impact they had on his career, but he also tagged the Recording Academy’s official Instagram account and asked them to give his Best Traditional Country Album nomination to Turnpike for The Price of Admission. “Volunteering to give up my nomination with the Recording Academy to the Turnpike Troubadours who not only earned the right with ‘Price Of Admission,’ but for which without Evan Felker I might not have ever even shown up on the map to be nominated in the first place. And besides, Evan Felker’s the best damn songwriter of all of us. See, Texas and Oklahoma can get along.” In response, Felker would take to his Instagram story, reposting Crockett’s post and thanking him before politely declining the replacement. “Any good thing in your world feels like a win for us my friend. Thanks for the kind words but y’all earned every bit of this. It didn’t happen overnight and nobody did it for you. The only thing I’ll ask is that you enjoy it. Love And Luck – EF.” Ultimately, it was never likely that Crockett could force the Recording Academy to volunteer his spot and replace his nomination with Turnpike. And Charley certainly deserves it as much as anybody. You could make the argument that Willie Nelson was nominated simply for being the living legend that he is, with Oh What A Beautiful World being a Rodney Crowell cover album. Of course, Willie just released a similar project dedicated to Merle Haggard, so while it’s still a great album, you could definitely make a case for Turnpike producing a more Grammy-worthy project. With that being said, however, you love to see the loyalty displayed by these two living legends. While it’s disappointing to see the clear and obvious snub, it will never take away from the fact that Turnpike is one of the greatest (if not the greatest country band of all time), and it’s made apparent by the respect so many artists such as Crockett have for the Red Dirt legends. 2026 Grammy Nominees Country Best Traditional Country Album Dollar A Day, Charley Crockett American Romance, Lukas Nelson Oh What A Beautiful World, Willie Nelson Hard Headed Woman, Margo Price Ain’t In It For My Health, Zach Top Best Contemporary Country Album Patterns, Kelsea Ballerini Snipe Hunter, Tyler Childers Evangeline Vs. The Machine, Eric Church Beautifully Broken, Jelly Roll Postcards From Texas, Miranda Lambert Best Country Solo Performance “Nose on the Grindstone,” Tyler Childers “Good News,” Shaboozey “Bad as I Used to Be [From F1® The Movie],” Chris Stapleton “I Never Lie,” Zach Top “Somewhere Over Laredo,” Lainey Wilson Best Country Duo/Group Performance “A Song to Sing,” Miranda Lambert And Chris Stapleton “Trailblazer,” Reba McEntire, Miranda Lambert, Lainey Wilson “Love Me Like You Used to Do,” Margo Price & Tyler Childers “Amen,” Shaboozey & Jelly Roll “Honky Tonk Hall of Fame,” George Strait, Chris Stapleton Best Country Song “Bitin’ List,” Tyler Childers, songwriter (Tyler Childers) “Good News,” Michael Ross Pollack, Sam Elliot Roman & Jacob Torrey, songwriters (Shaboozey) “I Never Lie,” Carson Chamberlain, Tim Nichols & Zach Top, songwriters (Zach Top) “Somewhere Over Laredo,” Andy Albert, Trannie Anderson, Dallas Wilson & Lainey Wilson, songwriters (Lainey Wilson) “A Song to Sing,” Jenee Fleenor, Jesse Frasure, Miranda Lambert & Chris Stapleton, songwriters (Miranda Lambert and Chris Stapleton) AMERICANA/ROOTS Best American Roots Performance “LONELY AVENUE,” Jon Batiste Featuring Randy Newman “Ancient Light,” I’m With Her “Crimson and Clay,” Jason Isbell “Richmond on the James,” Alison Krauss & Union Station “Beautiful Strangers,” Mavis Staples Best Americana Performance “Boom,” Sierra Hull “Poison in My Well,” Maggie Rose & Grace Potter “Godspeed,” Mavis Staples “That’s Gonna Leave a Mark,” Molly Tuttle “Horses,” Jesse Welles Best American Roots Song “Ancient Light,” Sarah Jarosz, Aoife O’Donovan & Sara Watkins, songwriters (I’m With Her) “BIG MONEY,” Jon Batiste, Mike Elizondo & Steve McEwan, songwriters (Jon Batiste) “Foxes in the Snow,” Jason Isbell, songwriter (Jason Isbell) “Middle,” Jesse Welles, songwriter (Jesse Welles) “Spitfire,” Sierra Hull, songwriter (Sierra Hull) Best Americana Album BIG MONEY, Jon Batiste Bloom, Larkin Poe Last Leaf on the Tree, Willie Nelson So Long Little Miss Sunshine, Molly Tuttle Middle, Jesse Welles Best Bluegrass Album Carter & Cleveland, Michael Cleveland & Jason Carter A Tip Toe High Wire, Sierra Hull Arcadia, Alison Krauss & Union Station Outrun, The Steeldrivers Highway Prayers, Billy Strings ALL-GENRE Record of the Year DtMF, Bad Bunny Manchild, Sabrina Carpenter Anxiety, Doechii WILDFLOWER, Billie Eilish Abracadabra, Lady Gaga Luther, Kendrick Lamar With SZA The Subway, Chappell Roan APT., ROSÉ, Bruno Mars Album of the Year DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS, Bad Bunny SWAG, Justin Bieber Man’s Best Friend, Sabrina Carpenter Let God Sort Em Out, Clipse, Pusha T & Malice MAYHEM, Lady Gaga GNX, Kendrick Lamar MUTT, Leon Thomas CHROMAKOPIA, Tyler, The Creator Song of the Year Abracadabra, Henry Walter, Lady Gaga & Andrew Watt, songwriters (Lady Gaga) Anxiety, Jaylah Hickmon, songwriter (Doechii) APT., Amy Allen, Christopher Brody Brown, Rogét Chahayed, Henry Walter, Omer Fedi, Philip Lawrence, Bruno Mars, Chae Young Park & Theron Thomas, songwriters (ROSÉ, Bruno Mars) DtMF, Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, Scott Dittrich,, Benjamin Falik, Roberto José Rosado Torres, Marco Daniel Borrero, Hugo René Sención Sanabria & Tyler Thomas Spry, songwriters (Bad Bunny) Golden [From “KPop Demon Hunters”], EJAE & Mark Sonnenblick, songwriters (HUNTR/X: EJAE, Audrey Nuna, REI AMI) Luther, Jack Antonoff, Roshwita Larisha Bacha, Matthew, Bernard, Ink, Scott Bridgeway, Sam Dew, Kendrick Lamar, Mark Anthony Spears, Solána Rowe & Kamasi Washington, songwriters (Kendrick Lamar With SZA) Manchild, Amy Allen, Jack Antonoff & Sabrina Carpenter, songwriters (Sabrina Carpenter) WILDFLOWER, Billie Eilish O’Connell & Finneas O’Connell, songwriters (Billie Eilish) Best New Artist Olivia Dean KATSEYE The Marias Addison Rae Sombr Leon Thomas Alex Warren Lola YoungThe post Charley Crockett Asks The Grammys To Give His Best Traditional Country Album Nomination To The Turnpike Troubadours first appeared on Whiskey Riff.