ACM Awards
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The Academy of Country Music will celebrate a major milestone next year, when the 60th Academy of Country Music Awards are held May 8, 2025 at the Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas. The ACM Awards will again be streamed live on Amazon Prime Video, according to an announcement on Tuesday (July 16) from the ACM, Prime Video and Dick Clark Productions.
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This marks the third consecutive year that the ACM Awards are broadcasting live from Texas (the ACM also celebrated its 50th-anniversary awards show in 2015 at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas). The Ford Center at the Star in Frisco opened in 2016, and serves as the practice facility for the Dallas Cowboys, as well as hosting major sporting events throughout the year. The 2023 ACM Awards were the first awards show to be held at the venue.
As previously announced, 16-time ACM Award winner Reba McEntire will return to host the event, marking her 18th time hosting the ACM Awards.
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“We’re excited to honor and celebrate the legacy of the ACM Awards all year long surrounding the 60th anniversary show returning to Amazon Prime Video next May,” Academy of Country Music CEO Damon Whiteside said in a statement. “Reba McEntire has hosted more ACM Awards shows than any other artist in history, and after her triumphant return this year for the 59th show, there is clearly no one better suited to helm this milestone show! Our landmark 50th anniversary show in 2015 marked our debut in Texas, and we’re thrilled to return again to celebrate another major moment in ACM history. We look forward to seeing our industry, artists, and fans celebrate in Frisco, Texas next May for an unforgettable week!”
“I’m thrilled to be coming back to host the 60th ACM Awards on Prime Video,” McEntire added. “It’s going to be an absolute can’t miss show and I can’t wait to see everybody back in Texas!”
The Academy of Country Music was founded in Southern California in 1964, operating as a regional trade organization, but in the six decades since its founding, the organization has enjoyed global reach in supporting and promoting country music. Now based in Nashville, the ACM boasts a record-high membership of over 5,000 members globally.
The 59th annual ACM Awards streamed live for an international audience across more than 240 countries and territories, via Prime Video and the Amazon Music channel on Twitch. The show featured performances from Kane Brown, Jelly Roll, Cody Johnson, Miranda Lambert, Post Malone, Lainey Wilson and more.
Wilson earned the ACM’s highest honor, entertainer of the year, which gained the Louisiana native the coveted ACM Triple Crown in only three years. Chris Stapleton led the evening with four overall wins, followed by Wilson with three trophies, and Luke Combs and Jordan Davis with two wins each.
More details regarding award submissions, voting timelines, nominees, performers, ticket sales and more will be revealed in the coming months.
In May, Jason Aldean took the stage at the Academy of Country Music Awards to honor the legacy of the late singer-songwriter Toby Keith with a version of Keith’s breakthrough hit “Should’ve Been a Cowboy.” Keith died in February at age 62, following a battle with stomach cancer. During a Monday (July 1) interview on […]
The Academy of Country Music has revealed this year’s slate of winners for the organization’s Industry Awards and Studio Recording Awards for the 59th annual Academy of Country Music Awards.
Steel guitar player Paul Franklin picks up his second ACM specialty instrument player of the year honor (which marks his 18th overall ACM Award, and he ties fellow steel guitarist J.D. Maness for the most ACM Studio Recording Award wins).
Dann Huff, whose illustrious list of clients includes Alabama, Brooks & Dunn, Merle Haggard, George Strait and Miranda Lambert, earns his fifth ACM producer of the year win (upping his total ACM Awards tally to 11). Meanwhile, Jimmie Lee Sloas picks up his fifth ACM bass player of the year win, and Rob McNelley wins his first ACM electric guitar player of the year accolade. Jim “Moose” Brown earns his third win for ACM piano/keys player of the year (in a tie with David Dorn, who picks up his second win in the category). Meanwhile, audio engineer Jim Cooley, and guitar player Charlie Worsham each earn their second career ACM Award for audio engineer of the year and acoustic guitar player of the year, respectively. Drummer Jerry Roe wins his first ACM Award, for drummer of the year.
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The ACM industry awards winners include two Nashville, Tennessee venues, with the Ryman Auditorium winning ACM theater of the year, while Bridgestone Arena won ACM arena of the year. This marks the Ryman’s eighth win and Bridgestone Arena’s sixth win.
Meanwhile, Uncasville, Connecticut’s Mohegan Sun Arena took home its eighth ACM award, in the casino of the year – arena category.
Red Rocks Amphitheatre in Morrison, Colo. won its third ACM outdoor venue of the year win (marking its fifth overall ACM accolade). Joe’s Live, in Rosemont, Ill., won its third ACM honor for club of the year, while the club’s owner, Ed Warm, picked up his first win for ACM Don Romeo talent buyer of the year (upping his total trophy count to six). The Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Tortuga Music Festival earned a third ACM Award for ACM festival of the year, while the Durant, Okla.-located Choctaw Grand Theater was named ACM casino of the year – theater.
The San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo earned its second ACM Award for ACM fair/rodeo of the year, while AEG promoter Adam Weiser earned his first ACM Award for ACM promoter of the year.
The winners were revealed via video announcements from Kelsea Ballerini, Dierks Bentley, Dan + Shay, Jordan Davis, Vince Gill, Cody Johnson, Parker McCollum, Justin Moore, Thomas Rhett, Tigirlily Gold and Keith Urban.
All of the winners will be celebrated during the Academy of Country Music Honors ceremony, slated for Wednesday, Aug. 21 at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium.
From the red carpet fashion to the emotional acceptance speeches, this year’s ACM Awards were full of memorable moments. But the highlight of the show was arguably the star-studded lineup of performances, from Dua Lipa‘s surprise cameo with Chris Stapleton to host Reba McEntire‘s blazing closing number. Lainey Wilson opened the show — which was […]
As a dad of three, Shay Mooney has had well over 10,000 hours of practice at fatherhood. And in an interview with Billboard on the Winner’s Walk carpet at the 2024 ACM Awards Thursday (May 16), the Dan + Shay band member passed on a little bit of sage advice to one of the duo’s past collaborators: Justin Bieber, who recently announced that he and Hailey Bieber are expecting their first child.
“You gotta learn as you go, you obviously pick things up as you go,” said Mooney, who shares sons Asher, Ames and Abram with wife Hannah Billingsley. “Justin, if you’re watching this, you’re gonna do just fine. You’re a good man.”
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“It’s gonna be awesome, I’m excited for them,” the singer added of his and bandmate Dan Smyers’ “10,000 Hours” duet partner. “It’s a new journey, and they have a lot of great people around them. I’m proud of him.”
The awards show — where Dan + Shay won the prize for duo of the year — comes just over a week after the Biebers revealed that they’re expanding their family. Hailey debuted her baby bump with the “Peaches” singer in photos taken at what appeared to be a vow renewal ceremony, posted by the Rhode founder on Instagram May 9.
Since then, the model has shared more photos of her bump and revealed her biggest pregnancy craving so far: pickles topped with egg salad and hot sauce. “No, you’re not allowed to judge!!” she wrote on Instagram Stories earlier this week, sharing a photo of the concoction.
Mooney and Smyers are currently closing out their first season on The Voice. They pair make up the first-ever coaching duo on the show, where they serve on the panel alongside Reba McEntire, John Legend and Chance the Rapper.
“I’ve enjoyed genuinely getting to work with the artists, really digging in,” Smyers told Billboard of their time on the series. “There’s so much thought that goes into the songs. Trying to give those artists their best shot, ’cause that’s an amazing moment for them.”
Chris Stapleton took home four awards at the 2024 ACM Awards Thursday night (May 16), but he may as well have won a fifth: best-kept secret, which he unofficially earned for his surprise duet with Dua Lipa during the ceremony.
Viewers were shocked to see the pop star take the stage with the country crooner at the Ford Center in Frisco, Texas, with the pair teaming up for a reimagined version of his “Think I’m in Love With You” midway through the show. (Sources onsite told Billboard that the pair is planning to release a collaboration together in the future, but neither musician has publicly confirmed the news.)
After the performance, Stapleton revealed on the Winner’s Walk carpet that he was almost equally surprised to see the duet materialize, telling Billboard‘s Melinda Newman that it came together in as little as two days.
“[Lipa] contacted the ACMs, and the ACMs contacted us,” he said, noting the “Houdini” singer’s dedication to making the partnership happen. “She’s very busy promoting her own record [Radical Optimism] right now. We kind of created this thing together in the last two days.”
Lipa also opened up to Billboard about the performance after the show, which was produced by Dick Clark Productions. “Lots of zip-up hoodies and running in and out of the arena [were involved],” she told reporter Lyndsey Havens of how she kept her appearance under wraps. “We were all so in on making sure that this stays a surprise to make the moment even more special. I don’t know how we did it, I’m glad we did it because it’s really special when it happened tonight on stage.”
In addition to performing, Stapleton also won male artist of the year, artist-songwriter of the year and album of the year for his 2023 record Higher at the ACMs. When Billboard asked him and his wife/collaborator Morgane which pop artist the country star would like to work with next, he replied, “I’d always say someone like Paul McCartney.”
He then added, “Harry Styles. [Morgane has] mentioned [him] a few times.”
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The year just keeps getting better for Jelly Roll. The “Son of a Sinner” singer added another notch to his gilded belt on Thursday night (May 16) at the 2024 ACM Awards when he shared the music event of the year prize with Lainey Wilson at the Ford Center at the Star in Frisco, Texas.
“First time nominated, first award and it couldn’t have happened for a more meaningful song,” Jelly Roll said of his win for “Save Me” with Wilson at the show produced by Dick Clark Productions. Speaking to Billboard after the event, Jelly said he decided to add Wilson to the song after he recorded it solo because he wanted to “hear it from a woman’s point of view.”
As an example of why that was definitely the right call, he said his stylist told him she listened to the track “1,000 times and loved it,” but when she heard the version with Wilson she cried because, as she told him, “it felt like it was one of us singing it. I was like, ‘WOW,’ it just covered me in chills. I knew then that it was going to be a special song.”
Jelly said he had a premonition that Wilson was going to be the biggest star on the planet, but after the breakout year she’s had, he thought, “What a great year for me to have a song with her!”
While Jelly Roll has been at the game for a while before his big blowup began taking hold over the last 24 months, he said he and pal Wilson talk all the time about the wild rocket ride of fame they’ve both been on lately and love to share notes and advice. “It’s been so awesome. We’ve been so paralleled and everything. We talk about it openly and honestly,” he said of the small group of fellow artists — which also includes Cody Johnson — that he huddles with to “lay it all on the table.”
In the midst of a red-hot streak that has had anyone and everyone knocking on his door for a collaboration, Jelly Roll had no problem naming the one call that wowed and delighted him the most. “Whenever I got the call to do the MusiCares with Jon Bon Jovi and then I met Sir Paul McCartney at the same time,” he said of the February gala honoring the Bon Jovi founder at which the country star performed a gritty cover of the Jersey rockers’ “Bad Medicine.”
“There’s a picture that exists on the Earth of me meeting Sir Paul McCartney and Jon Bon Jovi at the same time… that was the one that was like, ‘get out of here man!,’” he joked about the pic he keeps sending around to friends and swearing is not a PhotoShop job. Now that he’s been awarded for his Wilson collab, Jelly Roll said the next duet partner on his bucket list is definitely Jersey giant Bon Jovi. Or James Taylor, or Bob Seger.
Watch Jelly Roll talk about his big night and his pinch-me photo op above.
DCP is owned by Penske Media Eldridge, a Penske Media Corporation (PMC) subsidiary and joint venture between PMC and Eldridge. PMC is the parent company of Billboard.
Dua Lipa‘s surprise performance with Chris Stapleton at Thursday night’s (May 16) 2024 ACM Awards required some seriously stealth maneuvers. The “Training Season” singer took the stage to debut a new duet with Stapleton at the awards show at Ford Theater at the Star in Frisco, Texas and afterwards she talked to Billboard about how they pulled off the high-profile musical sneak attack.
“Lots of zip-up hoodies and running in and out of the arena,” she said of the lengths the two singer’s teams went to in keeping the secret under wraps. “We were all so in on making sure that this stays a surprise to make the moment even more special. I don’t know how we did it, I’m glad we did it because it’s really special when it happened tonight on stage.”
Stapleton won the artist of the year and album award at the 59th annual ACMs, but it was when he performed his song “Thing I’m in Love With You” with Dua — and his wife Morgane — that the audience at the Ford Theater sat up in their seats watching the two singers from different musical words meld their universes.
Dua said she was inspired to attend the ACMs and perform with Stapleton because she’s a “massive fan” of the singer she called a “master of his craft.” She also enjoyed sitting down with Stapleton to brainstorm how they could reimagine the song from his Higher album. “To even just spend a few days with him working with him, and his band and with his wife Morgane as well, it’s just been absolutely incredible. It’s just one of those moments in my life where i’m so happy to be a musician and to be creating something and doing something that feels so exciting,” she said.
At press time, reps for both singers had not responded to Billboard‘s request for comment about news that they plan to release the collaboration soon.
Lipa was also excited to see fellow pop-to-country crossover star Post Malone performing at Thursday’s event, but the thing that she was most psyched about was her new album, Radical Optimism, debuting at the peak of the Top Album Sales chart.
Dua said she celebrated the long-gestating album’s release at home with friends and family with food, drinks and music. And, because she was in Texas, she had to try some local bbq as well, of course. “That and going on a hunt for the best cowboy hat,” she said of her Lone Star state adventures.
Watch Dua Lipa talk about the surprise performance and her album’s chart debut in the video above.
The 59th annual Academy of Country Music Awards, held Thursday night (May 16) and streamed live on Amazon’s Prime Video, handed out awards to many artists whose music has had an undeniable impact over the past year, but they also deftly crammed more than a dozen performances into the space of two hours — including […]
Many of the awards at the 2024 Academy of Country Music Awards, which were presented on Thursday (May 16) at Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas, went as expected. Lainey Wilson’s second consecutive win as female artist of the year was a foregone conclusion. Old Dominion’s seventh consecutive win as group of the […]