Whose “Miss Independent” won the 2009 Best R&B Male Vocal Grammy? The answer is Ne-Yo.
The award’s official category name was Best Male R&B Vocal Performance, and Ne-Yo won it at the 51st Annual Grammy Awards, held on February 8, 2009. “Miss Independent” was released in 2008 as a single from his third studio album, Year of the Gentleman.
The song celebrates a self-sufficient woman who is confident, successful, and capable of standing on her own. Ne-Yo co-wrote it with Stargate’s Tor Erik Hermansen and Mikkel S. Eriksen. At the same ceremony, “Miss Independent” also won Best R&B Song, which recognizes the songwriters rather than the vocal performance alone.
A common mix-up is confusing the performance award with Best R&B Song: Ne-Yo was the winning performer in the former, while the latter credited the song’s writers. The Grammy category was later renamed Best Traditional R&B Vocal Performance in 2012, before further category changes altered how R&B vocal awards were organized.