Cirkut, winner of Best Dance Pop Recording, Producer of the Year, Non-Classical, and Best Pop Vocal Album for "MAYHEM," poses in the press room during the 68th GRAMMY Awards at Crypto.com Arena on February 01, 2026 in Los Angeles, California.
Cirkut is on a historic awards roll. On Feb. 1, he won the Grammy for producer of the year, non-classical. On March 28, he won the Juno Award in his native Canada in the same category (since 2002, the award has been named in honour of Jack Richardson, the late Canadian producer who is probably best known in the U.S. for helming The Guess Who’s 1970 smash “American Woman.”)
Cirkut (born Henry Russell Walter) is just the second producer to win both awards in the same calendar year. The first was David Foster, who took both awards in 1985, when his big credit was the hit-laden Chicago 17. One other producer, Daniel Lanois, has won both awards, but he has yet to win both in the same year.
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“It’s mind-blowing,” Cirkut told Billboard Canada’s Richard Trapunski of sharing awards history with Foster, who has been a force in pop music since 1973. “It’s amazing to be in the same sentence as someone like David Foster, who I look up to and respect so much.”
Cirkut also told Trapunski that the Juno win meant a lot to him, even though he has made it big internationally. “Being recognized by my Canadian peers means a lot. … I’m proud to be Canadian. I think I put a little bit of that into everything I do.”
The Grammys and Junos both first awarded producer of the year in 1975. Philly soul mastermind Thom Bell was the inaugural winner in the category at the Grammys. Randy Bachman, a founding member of both The Guess Who and Bachman-Turner Overdrive, was the first winner in the category at the Junos. (The Junos had previously presented related awards such as best produced single.)
Cirkut’s main credits in the past year were Lady Gaga’s “Abracadabra” and the Rosé/Bruno Mars collab “APT.,” both of which were Grammy-nominated for both record and song of the year, and Gaga’s album MAYHEM, which was Grammy-nominated for album of the year.
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Cirkut received seven Grammy nominations and wound up winning two awards (producer of the year and best dance pop recording for “Abracadabra”). He told Billboard’s Lyndsey Havens late last year that he had no idea why he had such a big Grammy year. “If I knew the key, I would do it every year,” he said.
This year marked Cirkut’s first Grammy nomination for producer of the year, non-classical. It represented his second win for producer of the year at the Junos. He first won in 2014, in tandem with Robin Thicke.
Foster has won producer of the year, non-classical at the Grammys three times – a total topped only by Babyface, with four wins. Foster’s tally of three wins is matched by just three other producers – Quincy Jones, Pharrell Williams and Jack Antonoff.
Foster won producer of the year at the Grammys in 1985 (in tie with Lionel Richie & James Anthony Carmichael), 1992 and 1994. Impressively, he also scooped up awards for record of the year and album of the year in both 1992 and 1994, thanks to his work on Natalie Cole’s Unforgettable With Love and Whitney Houston’s The Bodyguard soundtrack, respectively. He also had a record of the year nod in 1985 for Chicago’s “Hard Habit to Break.” At the Junos, Foster repeated his 1985 win in 1986, when his credits included the St. Elmo’s Fire soundtrack. He was the first producer to win back-to-back awards in that category.
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Lanois and Brian Eno won the Grammy for producer of the year, non-classical in 1993, in a tie with Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis. Lanois and Eno were also nominated for album of the year that year for their work on U2’s Achtung Baby. Lanois has won producer of the year at the Junos a record five times – in 1987, 1989 (in tandem with Robbie Robertson), 2002, 2009 and 2011. Trailing Lanois on the Juno leaderboard for most producer of the year wins are Bruce Fairbairn and Bob Rock, with three wins each.
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Cirkut, Foster and Lanois are the only Canadian producers to win the Grammy for producer of the year, non-classical. Cirkut, 39, was born in Ottawa, Ontario. Lanois, 74, was born in Hull, Quebec. Foster, 76, was born in Victoria, British Columbia.
Cirkut has won three Grammys and two Junos. Foster has won 16 Grammys and seven Junos. Lanois has won seven Grammys and eight Junos. Foster and Lanois have both been voted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame (in 1998 and 2002, respectively), but neither has yet received a Trustees Award from the Recording Academy. Memo to the Recording Academy: What are you waiting for?
Post Script: No woman has ever won producer of the year at the Grammys, either on her own or as part of a team. Six women have won in the category at the Junos – k.d. lang, Nelly Furtado, Alanis Morissette, Joni Mitchell, Diana Krall and WondaGurl (Ebony Naomi Oshunrinde). lang and Furtado both won as part of a team; the other four women won on their own.
