CV’s Tyler Coolidge Wins Grammy
Tyler Coolidge, a musician and music producer raised in Castro Valley, won the Grammy award for Best Contemporary Christian Music Performance or Song on February 4.
It was the first nomination for the artist, who goes by the lower-case tyler coolidge professionally. He received the award for his work as a composer and producer on “Your Power” by Lecrae & Tasha Cobbs Leonard. It had been his first work with those artists.
“It feels surreal,” he said of winning the honor. “I’m glad to be here and have it happened.”
“Most musicians don’t get this honor in their lifetime,” Coolidge added.
He hadn’t done that much work in Christian music, with his own work tending toward rap, hip-hop and rhythm and blues. Lecrae & Tasha Cobbs Leonard are, however, well-known in that field.
Coolidge said he’d been suggested to them by a fan of his own 2021 album “Moonside.”
So, did he find out about the honor in a big auditorium before a national television audience, and then share the glamour at multiple Grammy after-parties?
Not exactly, he said. Like the Oscars, the Grammy give out many of their less-prominent awards at a separate ceremony that isn’t televised, saving more widely followed categories for the literal big show.
Coolidge and his partners got their proper honors at that pre-show, broadcast on the Grammys own dedicated YouTube channel earlier in the afternoon, before the national show. You can watch the official announcement on his social media page, at twitter.com/tylercoolidge64.
But Coolidge knew he’d won earlier, when a friend from Castro Valley who was in Los Angeles for the weekend called him.
And those post-parties? He’d always thought they were free, especially if you’d just won an award, but that turned out not to be the case. They cost, and sometimes a lot, he said.
Currently based in San Diego for work, Coolidge would like to return to what he considers home in the Bay Area, preferably Castro Valley, soon. But he says, he doesn’t have quite the same industry connections here that he has in Southern California to get him bookings and find other work.
“If any of my fans here might just happen to know someone locally, they can put me in touch with, do tell me,” he said. You can best reach him via a message on Instagram at @tylercoolidge.
You can find “Your Power” on YouTube and elsewhere streaming, along with Coolidge’s previous and current work. His 2021 song “Slow Burner” has been particularly popular on YouTube. He’s also on SoundCloud and Spotify.