Grammys set to celebrate Taylor Swift as She eyes a record-breaking win with Boyfriend Travis Kelce Officially Announcing to be LIVE at During the event

A remarkable generation of hyper-astute young female musicians, spanning pop to R&B, indie-rock and beyond, are set to be celebrated at Sunday night’s Grammy awards – though the biggest prizes could end up being swept by just one of them, Taylor Swift.

The top categories are unprecedentedly dominated by women, with only one male artist, Jon Batiste, up for record, album or song of the year. In a week where major research studies in both the US and UK acknowledged progress around representation in a historically male-dominated and often sexist music industry – while also finding numerous examples of misogyny – the Grammys are a sign that at female artists, at least, are being celebrated at the highest level.

Top of the nominations is the 34-year-old vocalist SZA with nine, following the release of her second studio album, SOS, which topped the US chart, as did its lead single Kill Bill, a deceptively sweet tune carrying a murderous revenge fantasy. Critics thralled to the album’s range – her core R&B sits alongside hip-hop, folk instrumentation, rowdy rock and more – and to her often self-lacerating examination of love’s complexity.

But the night’s big winner could be Taylor Swift. There’s a sense that industry admiration is behind her following a year in which she dominated pop culture with her album Midnights and the subsequent career-spanning Eras tour – analysts expect it to make at least $2bn in revenue, over twice as much as the previous highest-grossing tour, by Elton John.

Swift is looking to become the first artist to win album of the year four times – she’s currently tied on three with Frank Sinatra, Stevie Wonder and Paul Simon – and her track Anti-Hero could earn her first wins in the record and song of the year categories.

R&B singer Victoria Monét has seven nominations in her breakthrough year as a solo artist, having previously been nominated as a songwriter for Ariana Grande and Chloe x Halle – and her two-year-old daughter Hazel, delivering delighted giggles as a featured artist on the song Hollywood, becomes the awards’ youngest ever nominee.

Other women with multiple nominations in the top categories are Lana Del Rey, Olivia Rodrigo, Miley Cyrus, Billie Eilish and Boygenius, each with their own particular flavour of heartache and existential angst. If Eilish wins record of the year – for a third time in five years – she would have the joint highest number of wins for an artist in that category, alongside Paul Simon and Bruno Mars.