Micki Grant was a composer, lyricist, bookwriter, singer, and actor. With Don’t Bother Me, I Can’t Cope in 1972, she became the first person to solely write book, music, lyrics and star in a Broadway musical. For the same show, she also became the first woman composer to win a Grammy for Best Score From an Original Cast Show Album. 

Her other Broadway writing credits include additional music and lyrics for Your Arms Too Short to Box With God (1976), songs for Working (1978), and It’s So Nice to Be Civilized (book, music, and lyrics, 1980). Her other writing work includes The Ups and Downs of Theophilis Maitland, Croesus and the Witch, Step Lively, Boy, music and lyrics for J. E. Franklin’s The Prodigal Sister (1974) and music and lyrics for Phillis (1986). She also wrote the English lyrics for Jacques Brel Blues. 

She received a Helen Hayes Award for her performance as Sadie Delaney in a two-year tour of Having Our Say (1996), which also ran six-weeks in Johannesburg, South Africa (1998). She is the recipient of the National Black Theatre Festival’s Living Legend Award (1999) and the AUDELCO’s Outstanding Pioneer Award in 2000. In February 2005, she was honored at the New Federal Theatre’s 35th Anniversary Gala. Grant garnered an OBIE Award for music and lyrics; a Drama Desk Award for lyrics and performance; an NAACP Image Award; an Outer Critics Circle Award for music, lyrics, and performance; and five Tony nominations. 

In 2013, Micki Grant was awarded the Dramatists Guild’s Lifetime Achievement Award where she also served on Council from 1999 until her death. She joined the Guild in 1972.