Cher went viral for accidentally declaring Luther Vandross as the Record of the Year winner instead of SZA and Kendrick Lamar.

Grammys producer breaks down Cher’s presenting gaffe: ‘You want a bit of anarchy’

Cher went viral for accidentally declaring Luther Vandross as the Record of the Year winner instead of SZA and Kendrick Lamar.

By Mekishana Pierre

Mekishana Pierre

Mekishana Pierre is a news writer at **. She has been working at EW since 2025. Her work has previously appeared on *Entertainment Tonight* and Popsugar.

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February 3, 2026 1:31 p.m. ET

Cher speaks onstage during the 68th Grammy Awards. Credit:

Kevin Winter/Getty

There's nothing like a little chaos to make the 2026 Grammys more exciting, according to executive producer Ben Winston.

While breaking down Sunday's eventful ceremony with *Rolling Stone* on a new episode of the outlet's *Rolling Stone Music Now *podcast, Winston recalled the series of flubs made by Cher during her first Grammys appearance in 18 years — including accidentally declaring the wrong winner for Record of the Year.

Fortunately, it wasn't *Moonlight* winning Best Picture at the Oscars level of a mix-up. The singer had been tasked with announcing the penultimate winner of the night after accepting her Lifetime Achievement Award from the Recording Academy, and had already been flustered by initially forgetting to do so and having to be called back by six-time host Trevor Noah.

"You've just gotta get up and bring her back," Winston remembered telling Noah, who quickly popped up from the audience to gently nudged the singer to return to her spot and announce the nominees and winner.

Ben Winston attend the 68th Grammy Awards.

Kevin Mazur/Getty

But when Cher made her way back to the stage, the confusion wasn't over. The moment the camera returned to her after presenting the nominees for Record of the Year, Cher paused slightly with the winner envelope in her hand, looking into the camera for a few beats before exclaiming, "Oh, they told me it was going to be on the prompter!"

As the audience laughed, Cher opened the envelope and read out "Luther Grandoss" (which many interpreted as her naming Vandross, who died in 2005), before quickly correcting herself and naming the actual winners, Kendrick Lamar and SZA for their song "Luther."

Both artists took a beat before realizing they had won. Cher even appeared to mouth, "I'm so sorry," as the duo and their producing crew walked onstage before stepping aside.

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"I promise you, we had briefed her, and I promise you, what she had to do was in the prompter," Winston said, although he admitted that he enjoyed still enjoyed the messiness of the situation. "If I could go back in time, I'd want that to happen again."

The producer added that Cher hadn't been terribly nonplussed about the situation. "She's happy with it. She had a great time," he shared. "You want a bit of anarchy."

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The winners of the night weren't stressed over the moment either. SZA even defended the singer while chatting with *Entertainment Tonight* after Sunday night's ceremony.

Kendrick Lamar, SZA, Scott Bridgeway, and Cher onstage during the 68th GRAMMY Awards.

Kevin Winter/Getty

As SZA pointed out, since her and Lamar's Grammy-winning song actually samples Vandross and Cheryl Lynn's cover of "If This World Were Mine," the blunder makes even more sense. "We share the frequency of the song," SZA said. "Like, that's his frequency that allowed us to win and that allowed it to be memorable."

"So, she's not wrong, and she's from that era," the Grammy winner continued. "She probably really knew Luther Vandross. Of course, her brain and her energy is connecting that energy to the energy that we're sharing. We're mooching off of what Luther already gave us, so we're grateful. It's like, I wish I could speak to him. Thank you, Luther."

*See the complete list of Grammys 2026 winners here.***

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Source: “EW Grammys”