Chaka Khan, Kelly Rowland & More Honored at 2026 Black Women in Music Dinner

Khan received the Vanguard Award, recognizing her legendary status in the music industry and her lasting influence across genres and generations. The award was presented by Sherrese Clarke, founder and CEO of HarbourView Equity Partners. Khan has won 10 Grammys in addition to a lifetime achievement award from the Recording Academy, which she received at the Special Merit Awards on Jan. 31. In 2023, she was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame via their award for musical excellence.

“I don’t know how long we’ve been trying to pull it together, but I think that Black women finally found the beauty within ourselves and each other,” Khan said. “I feel so overwhelmed right now, this evening, with high spirit. You know what I’m talking about. I don’t even know what to do with it. You know, I know that I am finally witnessing, feeling, smelling, hearing, listening to and being next to special people like me, very like-minded, we’re very alike, and it’s been never forever that I’ve been able to say that, or to feel that way about my sisters.”

“I want us to be in the trenches together, because that’s what’s coming, that’s what’s happening. This madness that we are witnessing right now all over the planet, we got a lot of work to do, there are lots to do, but I would rather do it. I wouldn’t rather do it with anybody else but y’all.”

Khan discussed her move to Georgia. “I had to get out of cities, so I could hear God to be spirit, and it’s done such good things for me. I might suggest that you take some time out of your busy schedule and the cause of that, you know, and take some time and go and lay in the grass, that’s what it’s really about. … I play with my horses, and I play with the chickens, and I plant trees, and I found a love and a reality that is necessary for us.”

After a long and wide-ranging improvised speech, Khan briefly pivoted to the remarks that had been written for her that were loaded into the teleprompter. “I’m going to be reading this thing. Yeah, I mean that’s what they wrote. I didn’t write it.”

Khan is too much of a free spirit to stick to the script, so she went back to improvising.

“I’ve seen trends come and go, I’ve seen many people I love come and go, and you call me crazy, but I talk to them, and it helps. It helps me. I hope they hear me. I know it helps me, and I think that there is a communication going on. I believe deeply in spirit, and I live by the voice of spirit, that’s [what] I live by. I can’t handle it any other way. So that’s all I’m saying. Black women have always been the heart of me.”

Kelly Rowland received the Velvet Guard Award, “celebrating her artistry and presence that have become woven into the fabric of culture.” Rowland is a four-time Grammy winner — three times with Destiny’s Child and once as a solo artist for “Dilemma,” her 2002 collab with Nelly, which won best rap/sung collaboration.

Knowles gave a very warm introduction to Kelly Rowland, who rose to fame in Destiny’s Child alongside Knowles’ daughter, Beyoncé.

“Kelly, you are a rare gem, and it has been a joy to be a bonus mom. You’re a superstar in every sense of the word, and you are also the best wife, mother, sister, friend and daughter anyone can ask for. … Over the years, I’ve had the privilege of watching Kelly grow into the most remarkable woman she is today. Her journey is an undeniable master class in grit and longevity, and while the world sees the superstar, the performer, the actress and the icon, I’ve had the opportunity to witness something even more special: her character and pure heart. Kelly has always led with grace, navigating every season of her life and career with strength, humility and an unwavering sense of self in an industry that can often challenge your spirit.”

There were problems with the teleprompter during Rowland’s speech, but she simply winged it and spoke from the heart.

“Mama T, thank you so much. Y’all don’t even understand how this woman just goes from myself to my sisters and making sure she shows up for us in such a way that is unbelievable at times, and I appreciate you, Mom. I love you. Thank you for calling me yours. I love being yours. I am grateful for you. Thank you for your prayers. Thank you for always holding me and teaching me so much about womanhood, about life, about being a Black woman, about working our behinds off, all of it. Entrepreneurship, I learned that in your space. I love you. I celebrate you every day.

“To the women who have blazed the path in which we started together, I’ll start with [fellow Destiny’s Child founding members] LeToya [Luckett] and Latavia [Roberson]. You know, we started when we were little kids. It was just a dream. I’m just thinking about women who have impacted my life, because this is Black women in music, and I think about them, they were at the start, you know, the very beginning, we just were dreaming together, and then there’s Michelle [Williams], who came onto a moving train, a fast-moving train, and she did it with such grace, and she took everything that came her way. It just showed me what a woman she is, how strong she is, how I’m so grateful for her as my sister, and for having 26 years with her, and celebrating not just music, but womanhood, and what that means.

“To my sister Beyoncé, who was relentless — you know, we were relentless together — who was incredibly patient in giving of the gift and the creativity and showed us the work and made us just really push ourselves to work harder than everybody else. To be honest, that’s why you see all of the film, all those women helped to shape and make me into the woman I am today. To my mother, so many things that you learn about women once they’ve gone on. I’ve learned so much about my mom, actually not being here, about her strength as a woman. We moved to a city in which we knew no one, and we made a way, she made a way, and I think that’s what we do. That’s so special as women. We make a way, Black women make a way, right? We are resilient.

“I look around this room, and I see the women in here tonight, Sylvia Rhone, Chaka. There is no word for Chaka Khan. I think about my musical heroes who have gone before me: Roberta Flack, Lauryn Hill, Janet Jackson, Whitney Houston, Aretha Franklin. They laid down the road. They walked, so that we could run. Thank you for allowing us to run.”

Choreographer Fatima Robinson received the Guardian of Vision Award for her impact on shaping the moves of music’s biggest stars, including Michael Jackson, Aaliyah, Backstreet Boys and Mary J. Blige. Robinson’s choreography credits for film and TV include Save the Last Dance, Dreamgirls and The Wiz Live! The award was presented by legendary music executive Sylvia Rhone.

Rhone presented the award to Robinson, calling her “my sister, friend, my creative guru and one of the most influential visionaries of all time.” Robinson accepted it with a thoughtful and eloquent speech about how she is living out the dream her parents, both highly creative, put aside as not being “practical.”

“As I stand here tonight. I find myself thinking less about my accomplishments and more about inheritance, because vision does not begin with us,” Robinson said. “Vision is passed down. My story began before I even took a step. My mother was a majorette at Tennessee State University. My father was a musician in the band.  A dancer and a musician would eventually bring a choreographer into the world. Now this is a divine foreshadowing. I don’t know what it is, but like so many artists in their generation, they were told a familiar story. Music wasn’t practical, dance wasn’t realistic, art wasn’t a career, it was a hobby, a dream, something you love, but certainly not something you built a life around. So, like many Black families, they made sacrifices, they chose stability, they chose safety, they chose survival. And I often think about how many songs, paintings, dances, books, inventions and masterpieces were buried inside people who never received encouragement to become themselves or gave themselves the permission. How many symphonies and songs died in silence? How many poems never left the stage? How many visionaries spent their lives convincing themselves to be realistic — but dreams have a funny way of refusing to die. Sometimes they skip a generation, and what my parents had chosen to set aside somehow found its way into me.

“I became a child of hip-hop, a child of rhythm, a child of imagination. Hip-hop wasn’t just music, it was possibility, it was declaration that creativity could rise from anywhere. It taught me that greatness wasn’t reserved for people who started with advantages. Greatness belonged to people willing to create something from nothing. And so dance became my compass, the thing that made me feel closest to God, not because it was safe, not because it was logical, but because it set me on fire and felt true. And I’ve learned something about truth. Truth has a rhythm. Yeah, it keeps tapping on your shoulder until you listen, it keeps calling your name until you answer. Dance was for truth. So I walked into rooms I had never seen before, rooms where nobody looked like me, rooms where I wasn’t sure I belonged, and like many in this room, I learned something important: sometimes confidence is not believing you belong, but walking in anyway. I learned how to create my own seat at the table, and when the table was too small, I learned how to build another one. Because the purpose of breaking barriers is not simply to get through them. The purpose is to leave the door open behind you. This is how culture evolves.

“And this is how movements happen. This is how generations arise. And I want to say something tonight about Black women, because history often talks about Black women as contributors to culture, but the truth is, Black women have never merely contributed to culture. Black women have authored culture. We have been architects disguised as laborers, visionaries disguised as support systems, roots buried beneath the earth.

“Which brings me back to vision. People often think vision is about seeing the feature. I don’t think that’s true. I think vision is about seeing potential and evoking possibility into being vision is looking at an acorn and seeing an oak tree. Vision is looking at a blank stage and seeing a standing ovation. Vision is looking at a young person and seeing who they can become before they recognize themselves. …. That is vision, not predicting the future, believing in someone else’s future, and every woman this room has done that for someone. Someone believed in us, someone prayed for us, someone encouraged us, someone handed us a torch, and now it’s our turn. Our responsibility is not merely to succeed, our responsibility is to expand what is possible, to leave behind roads where were once walls, to leave behind maps there was once wilderness, to leave behind courage where there was once fear, because somewhere tonight there’s a young girl with a dream that makes no practical sense. A dream people will tell her is unrealistic. A dream. My hope is that when she arrives in her moment, she finds the path a little wider because of what we built, she finds the doors a little easier to open because of what we unlocked.”

Music executive Natina Nimene received the New Guard Award, celebrating her role as a game-changing leader who inspired future generations and energized the music industry. The award was presented by her mentor, Juliette Jones.

“When I met her, she was a passionate, energetic, sassy 23-year-old,” Jones said. “Today she’s all of those things, except for being 23. I think it’s important to note that she has managed to remain herself and excel in such an incredibly challenging business. I think it’s what is a big part of her superpower.”

In accepting the award, Nineme said: “I’m so used to being on the other side of rooms like this that when Connie called me, I thought she wanted someone else, like I was so confused … and she’s like, ‘No, I want you,’ so I was stunned, but I am so grateful, I’ve always been the person on the other side of these rooms with my head down, doing the work and making sure everyone else shines, so to be seen tonight means the world to me.

“Juliette, having you present me with this award, my heart is so full, and it’s so incredibly special. When she met me, I was an assistant at a radio station, and she was so fancy and so fly, and I wanted to be just like her, and I like stalked her, and she fell in love with me the first day we met, and she gave me my first shot, so you changed the trajectory, you changed the trajectory of my life, and I will never forget that. So, thank you.

“I believe deeply in empowering women and pulling as I climb and making sure there’s room at the table and building new tables where there weren’t, because none of us get here alone. I’ve had the pleasure of working with incredible artists, managers, executives throughout my career who have trusted me, challenged me, and helped to shape me. I remember being a kid interning at WDTC in Detroit, Michigan, watching the late great Lisa Coleman boss Andre 3000 and Big Boi around when they were promoting [OutKast’s] Speakerboxxx/The Love Below album, and I was stunned, and I walked up to her, and I said, ‘What?’ Because I thought I was going to be [radio personality] Angie Martinez, by the way. That’s what I thought I wanted to do, until I saw her, and then I said, ‘So what is that job?’ And she said, ‘Well, I’m a record rep,’ and I said, ‘OK, so that’s what I want to do.’ I want to boss rappers around, and I do, just kidding, just kidding. I love them.

“I didn’t fully understand it then, but I knew I wanted to be in the business, and I wanted to be in rooms where cultures were shaped, like tonight. I’m from Toledo, Ohio, a small city that didn’t even have a radio station. I used to wait for it to rain in order to hear WJLB in Detroit come in clearly. I used to pray for rain. That’s how passionate and how deep my love for music was at an early age.

“What means most to me today is the trust that artists place in me to help shape their vision, protect their voice, and bring their dreams to life. And I don’t take that lightly, as this industry continues to shift, and as the space for Black women executives can sometimes feel like it’s shrinking. It’s on us to support each other, mentor, advocate and make sure the next generation has even more access, opportunity and power than we did. Sisterhood to me is not just a bond, it’s a responsibility. It’s how we show up for each other, how we speak each other’s names in rooms we’re not in, and how we make sure none of us are left behind. I am so grateful to have so many of my sisters and friends-turned-family here with me tonight. This New Guard Award is special because it’s just not about where I’ve been, it’s about what we’re building, and I’m committed to opening doors and inspiring the next generation to walk through them boldly, and if there is a young girl here watching who’s praying for her moment the way I once prayed for rain, just know it’s coming.”

Gail Mitchell, veteran music journalist and Billboard’s editor at large, R&B/hip-hop, and Ebonie Smith, music producer, engineer, musician and A&R executive, received Guardian Angel Spotlights. This recognition celebrates individuals who serve as messengers, protectors and guides within the music industry. The awards were presented by DJ Kiss.

Accepting her award, Mitchell said she found her calling in music journalism after she had a hard time landing a job in TV or film.

“My first job in the music industry after college, I couldn’t find a job in TV or film, nobody wanted to hire me, so I ended up — because I could type 120 words a minute — as the executive assistant to the president of a radio chain. So that’s where I started, and that’s when I learned about Billboard and other veterans in a room who remember Cash Box and Record World and other publications, and I thought, hey, I can marry my love of writing with music, which I love, thanks to both of my parents, but I never imagined standing here before you guys here on stage to receive an award for something I love to do, and that’s helping singers, songwriters, producers, executives tell their stories and keep paying it forward.

“All I’ve ever tried to do is elevate, inspire, open doors and shine a light on the obstacles that Black women and men still face in this music industry. I still wonder sometimes when I’m writing at 6 a.m., at 3 a.m., at 2 a.m. in the morning, if anybody’s really reading the stories I write, and looking and receiving this award lets me know that that you are actually out there reading and recognizing me, so I appreciate it. I’m thrilled to be among such a distinguished slate of women.”

Smith opened her acceptance speech by saying, “Black women have not been as included in the music production process as they should be,” and then she proceeded to explain why that matters.

“[Music is] sonic information, it’s our cultural blueprint, the lyrics, the beats, the tracks, the compositions, the melodies. That’s information. It tells us who we are. The music that we make, the records that have come out of our music industry go on and teach the world who we are long before we ever have an opportunity to travel anywhere. It preserves our language, preserves our swag, it preserves everything about our identity as Black folks. It’s the way that we reach out to the world and the way the world reaches out to us, and it is the main way we manage true emancipation in this nation, so who creates our records? Who’s in the studio working with the artist, stewarding them, helping them identify who they are, and place that clear identity, that sonic identity onto records, those people matter. The music producers of our industry are our film directors. They are just as important. They are creating the sonic vision that will go on to change a nation and to create the health of our people. More women need to be in the studios, and that is why Gender Amplified exists.

“So I do urge each of you in this room to reach out to the women music producers, take a chance, they’re on the internet, they’re on social media. Go look for those producers that you may not know anything about, they may be completely obscure. Look for them, the A&R here, the executives that can really make a difference. We’re there, we’re working, and we need you.”