NASHVILLE (Top40 Charts) - When
Tim McGraw sang "Things Change" at last year's Country
Music Association Awards, he had no idea how prophetic the song would seem just a year later.
Wednesday (Nov. 8) night at the 35th Annual CMA Awards, McGraw was named Entertainer of the Year for the first time, leading a winners' list that included 24 first-time winners and didn't have a single repeat winner from the previous year.
The triple-platinum soundtrack from O Brother, Where Art Thou? provided the night's only double winner, as the soundtrack won Album of the Year and the Soggy Bottom Boys' "I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow" was picked over four chart-topping hits as Single of the Year.
"No way this just happened!" Dan Tyminski exclaimed as he accepted the Single trophy. Tyminski sang lead on "Constant Sorrow," providing the film voice for actor George Clooney.
Tyminski and his fellow O Brother musicians had seemed almost uncomfortable at the beginning of the night, as they arrived at the red-carpet "Starwalk." Gillian Welch rushed down the path so quickly, assuming that the paparazzi were interested only in the likes of Garth Brooks or a six-month pregnant Faith Hill, photographers had to call out for her to come back so they could take her picture.
"I'm not used to this whole red-carpet thing," she said apologetically.
Tim McGraw |
At the end of the evening, Tyminski and Welch stood onstage at the Grand Ole Opry House with a part of the Nashville music scene that almost never gets national network exposure as producer T-Bone Burnett accepted the Album of the Year award.
"I just want to say that working on this record and this film was nothing but fun and a great privilege, and how grateful we are to bring this to you," he said.
Artists who shared the O Brother spotlight - ranging from Ralph Stanley to the young Peasall Sisters - weren't the night's only rookie winners. Country Music Hall of Famers Buck Owens and Bill Anderson won the first CMA Awards of their careers when "Too Country," which they sang with Brad Paisley and George Jones, won for top vocal event.
Toby Keith won Male Vocalist of the Year; Lee Ann Womack won Female Vocalist of the Year. Brooks & Dunn returned to the top of the Vocal Duo category, which they've dominated for the past decade but lost last year. Lonestar came out on top in the Vocal Group of the Year competition. Australian singer guitarist Keith Urban won the Horizon Award, given to artists whose career has advanced the most in the past year.
The musicians and the industry gave clear signals to country radio that they planned to reclaim country music, giving the top single ("I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow") and song ("Murder on Music Row") trophies to records that didn't even break the top 10.
Though the evening opened and closed on strongly patriotic notes - starting with Brooks & Dunn's "Only in America" and ending with an all-star choir performance of "America the Beautiful" - the nationalism was subdued during the middle of the program.
Lee Ann Womack |
Still, the Dixie
Chicks and
Alan Jackson performed unreleased songs that addressed the times. The Dixie
Chicks sang "Travelin' Soldier," written by Emily Robison's brother-in-law, Bruce Robison, and Farrah Braniff. Jackson's "Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)" was the show's emotional highlight, addressing the varied, stunned reactions of
America to the tragedies of Sept. 11: "Did you lay down at night and think of tomorrow?/Go out and buy you a gun?/Did you turn off that violent old movie you're watchin'/And turn on
I Love Lucy reruns?"
Watching from Nashville, CMA Awards looked like the rebirth of a musical genre that has suffered years of commercial and creative decline. Perhaps it takes difficult, troubled times to make country entertainers realize what they do best, and the profitable '90s had simply turned them slack and lazy.
Wednesday night, though, performers like Jackson, Womack, and Diamond Rio looked as good as they ever had in their careers. Imagine a night where the biggest singer in country music (Garth Brooks) and the best singer in country music (George Jones) sing a duet and nail it - and they're still not the highlight of the evening.
Here is a complete list of winners for the 35th annual CMA Awards:
Entertainer of the Year: Tim McGraw
Top Female Vocalist:: Lee Ann Womack
Top Male Vocalist:: Toby Keith
Top Vocal Duo:: Brooks & Dunn
Vocal Group of the Year: Lonestar
Single Record of the Year: "I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow," the Soggy Bottom Boys, T-Bone Burnett (producer)
Song of the Year: "Murder on Music Row," Larry Cordle, Larry Shell
Vocal Event of the Year: Too Country, Brad Paisley with featured vocals by George Jones, Bill Anderson, Buck Owens
Music Video of the Year Award: "Born to Fly," Sara Evans
Album of the Year: O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Horizon Award: Keith Urban
Musicians of the Year: Dann Huff
