Women Rule the Country Music Awards!

Live from Nashville, on Wednesday, November 13th, was the 53rd annual Country Music Association Award show which was nationally broadcasted.  This years’ rendition of the biggest night of the year for country music was jam-packed with star-studded performances and awards given out.  

A huge focus around the show this year was to empower the women of the country music industry so one way to highlight that was to have a female power group, none other than Carrie Underwood, Reba McEntire and Dolly Parton host the show.  All three women’s charisma, humor, and professionalism definitely contributed to how big of a success the 53rd CMA Awards were.  To celebrate the women of country music, the show opened up with a huge performance from the three hosts and several other female country stars who all sang legendary songs from the hall of fame female country music legends.  

To many country music fans’ surprise, the biggest award of the night, Entertainer of the Year, was won by the one and only Garth Brooks. while many thought Carrie Underwood was going to take home the huge honor since she just recently wrapped her highly successful Cry Pretty Tour.  Even though many country music fans’ hoped and expected Carrie Underwood to win Entertainer of the Year, Garth Brooks definitely has worked long and hard to deserve to win this award once again.  He’s the biggest selling country artist in history and he continues to sell out to full capacity football stadiums across the country.  

Another award given out that night was for Album of the Year which was won by Maren Morris for her 2019 album Girl.  Her songs on this album including “Girl” and “The Bones” all thrived on the country music charts and in support of her album release, her Girl: The World Tour was extremely successful and showed the world that she could sell out highly notable venues around the world such as Radio City Music Hall right here in New York City.  

Other than the awards given out to more than deserving country stars, the night was filled with wonderful performances.  After the first performance, which was the opening to the show that honored the women of country music, the awarded vocal duo of the year, Dan + Shay, performed their hit song “Speechless” while being accompanied by an illustrious orchestra and a piano.  Also, the awarded vocal group of the year, Old Dominion, performed their hit song “One Man Band” while standing in front of a screen that looked like an empty theater.  Another relevant point that night was the evolving of the country music genre to incorporate pop stars into the genre.  This was shown when pop star Pink performed “Love Me Anyway” with Chris Stapleton and when pop star Halsey performed a medley of the songs “What If I Never Get Over You” and “Graveyard” with Lady Antebellum.  Something really unique about the CMAs is the tradition of bringing back older country artists and this was done in a few big performances such as when Brothers Osborne performed “Hard Workin’ Man” with the legendary Brooks & Dunn and when Kacey Musgraves performed “Rainbow Connection” with the legendary Willie Nelson.  

In conclusion, even though not every country artist in attendance was able to walk away with an award, they are all in support of each other and that’s what continues to strengthen the country music world.