Doja Cat was named pop songwriter of the year at the privately-held BMI Pop Awards on May 9 at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif.Though she wasn’t present at the ceremony, Doja Cat had six of the most-performed songs of 2022 – “Get Into It (Yuh)” (co-written with Sully and Y2K), “I Like You (A Happier Song)” (co-written with Jasper Harris), “Need to Know,” “Vegas” (co-written with Rogét Chahayed and Yeti Beats), “Woman” (co-written with Aaron Horn (PRS), Linden Jay (PRS), Jidenna and Yeti Beats) and “You Right.”
Khalid was presented with the BMI Champion Award by BMIpresident and CEO Mike O’Neill, who lauded the singer-songwriter’s musical contributions, industry accolades (he’s amassed 18 BMI awards) and dedication to uplifting future songwriters.
Alongside his mother, Linda Wolfe, Khalid started the Great Khalid Foundation in 2020, which offers music education programs, scholarship awards and community partnerships for young artists. Among its many efforts, the foundation recently helped donate backpacks to middle schools and put together a Mother’s Day essay-writing contest.
After his acceptance speech, the BMI Champion treated audiences to an acoustic performance of his debut smash single, “Location,” along with “Better” and “Talk.”
BMI’s pop song of the year award went to “Stay” written by Cashmere Cat, Isaac “Zac” De Boni, Omer Fedi, Haan, the Kid Laroi (APRA), Michael “Finatik” Mulé, Charlie Puth and Blake Slatkin. Other winners include Sony Music Publishing, who received the coveted publisher of the year award for representing 24 of the previous year’s most performed songs — from Steve Lacy’s Grammy-nominated “Bad Habit” to Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill.”
The evening welcomed guests and honorees from all over the pop scape including Imagine Dragos, Dove Cameron, Polow da Don, Lauren Spencer Smith and Justin Tranter, among others. A total of 53 BMI artists were first-time Pop award winners including Gayle and Sara Davis (for “abcdefu”), Tyler Cole (for “Meet Me at Our Spot”) and dazy and Nicky Youre (for “Sunroof”). To view a complete list of winners, see here.
