Clear your calendar and set your DVRs, because this fall, the culture is getting its flowers — twice. The Soul Train Awards are riding again, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is inducting one of its most soulful classes ever, and one of hip-hop’s founding mothers is bringing the celebration right here to Atlanta.
🚂 Soul Train Awards return — with a CBS twist
After three years away, the Soul Train Awards are back where they belong. The show tapes November 5 at Chicago’s Harris Theater — the city where Don Cornelius started it all more than 50 years ago — and airs Friday, November 27 at 8 PM ET/PT on BET and, for the first time ever, CBS (plus BET Her, VH1, MTV2 and Logo).
Hosting the homecoming: Anthony Anderson, who knows a thing or two about the big stage — he’s hosted the BET Awards twice, the NAACP Image Awards eight straight years, and the Emmys. “I’m thrilled to be back with BET and especially excited to host Soul Train Awards in Chicago, where the Soul Train legacy began,” Anderson said. “Don Cornelius created a platform that gave Black artists a place to shine, and generations later, that spirit is still alive.”
And for the first time in the show’s history, the fans picked the winners in two brand-new categories. The R&B/Soul Song of the Year field is stacked — Brent Faiyaz’s “Butterflies,” Bruno Mars’ “I Just Might,” Kehlani’s “Folded,” Mariah the Scientist’s “Is It a Crime,” Tems’ “What You Need,” Tyla’s “Chanel” and more — and Tems is the only artist nominated in both fan-voted categories, also landing in Spotify’s RNB X International Artist race. Fans also voted all month on the 20 Greatest R&B Songs of the 2020s, with the final countdown set to be revealed on the “Back on Track” red carpet show. Performers and honorees are still to come — BET is keeping this rollout hot.
🏆 The Rock Hall class of 2026 is LOADED
Two weeks before Soul Train airs, on Saturday, November 14, the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inducts its 2026 class at the Peacock Theater in Los Angeles (watch it in December on ABC and Disney+). And look at these names: Wu-Tang Clan. Sade. Luther Vandross. All three are entering in the Performer Category — Wu-Tang and Luther as first-time nominees — alongside Phil Collins, Billy Idol, Iron Maiden, Joy Division/New Order and Oasis.
Then there’s the Early Influence Award, and it reads like a Mount Rushmore of the culture: Queen Latifah, MC Lyte, Fela Kuti, Celia Cruz and Gram Parsons. Two queens of hip-hop, honored forever. As Rock Hall chairman John Sykes put it, induction is “music’s highest honor” — and this year, the honor is landing exactly where it should.
🎤 Atlanta, your date with a legend: November 9 & 10
Here’s the part you can actually pull up to. MC Lyte’s “Road to the Hall of Fame Tour” — part concert, part storytelling, part living hip-hop history — plays Atlanta on November 9 and 10, just days before her induction. This is the FIRST solo female rapper ever nominated for a Grammy, the FIRST female rapper to earn a gold single, the FIRST rap artist to perform at Carnegie Hall — performing her catalog and telling the stories behind it, right here at home.
From Chicago to Los Angeles to the A — honors season is ours this year. We’ll see you in the building. ✌🏾
Sources: BET via That Grape Juice, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame via Broadway World, MC Lyte tour press release.
More from FreddyO: from the FreddyO archive: BET Honors 2010 photos and video
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