Academy of Country Music Recognizes George Strait As Artist of the Decade

I don’t mean to start a political firestorm here (and I’d appreciate it if everybody else follow my intention on that point), but the inner workings and relationships of the country music scene always fascinate me…

(For instance, I’ve always wondered whether some unspoken animosity exists between the members of Montgomery Gentry and John Michael Montgomery, who split from an earlier band all three were a part of for a solo music career.)

That list of “retitled” country music tours suggests some tension between Big Kenny and John Rich, and their Wikipedia article notes that the band is currently on hiatus. Is the suggestion of tension purely speculative, or is there a source stating such?

Confessor–Eddie Montgomery was his brother’s road manager for several years early in John Michael’s career, almost up until MG took off. Troy Gentry also pursued a solo career for a while and won a Jim Beam talent contest. So, no, there wasn’t any animosity between the brothers over John Michael going solo.

Amazace–George Jones has rarely written any of his hits. Same goes for Patsy Cline, Ray Price…the list goes on and on. If they were named Artists of the Decade in their time, wyould you criticize them for not writing their biggest hits?

You can like or dislike Strait for the songs he chooses or his performances of them. But I am always, um, amazed that anyone uses “he doesn’t write his own songs” as a criticism for a successful country artist–or a singer most any other genre. (And I guarantee you Jones doesn’t pick up his guitar until tour time, either, nor does Price spend a lot of time with music when he’s off the road.)

I love a lot of performers because of the songs they’ve written, but I also love a lot of great singers for how they’ve interpreted the material of others.

I realize Jones, Cline, and Price didn’t write their songs, but as far as I know they were never awarded Artist of a decade either. The key word here being “Artist”. To me that is someone who is a singer, songwriter, musician. Someone who transcends both Pop and Roots music, and who loves music so much they can’t be without it either on or off the road. To me that’s a musical “artist”.

Twist it all you want, but George Strait sings cover songs. He’s like the Pat Boone of Pop Country, but like I said this is the acm. I expect nothing more. Van Gogh was a painter, I painted a barn once. Are we both artists?

How can you have a problem with George Strait? Seriously, who else is there? Brad Paisley? Kenny Chesney? Alan Jackson? Keith Urban? I couldn’t see them logically picking any of them over George.

I knew this would fire up some people. Seriously, I don’t care what the acm’s do. Elvis was a great entertainer. I’ll pass on Reba, the Queen of oversing. Most everyone I listen to is a singer/songwriter, and even though she’s not known as a songwriter, the only real candidate for “Artist of The Decade” is Alison Krauss.

Marc, that’s my question. Which decade?

I wonder if Allison Kraus sleeps with her fiddle when she’s not on tour?

Amazace,

When Willie is singing Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain is he only functioning in the capacity of entertainer whereas he is only functioning as “artist” when performing original songs?

To say that singer-songwriters are the only “real” artists ignores a whole heap of country music history. Aside from the George Jones, Ray Price, Patsy Cline argument, some of the best work of classic, legendary singer songwriters were not their own songs.

Hank Williams broke through with Lovesick Blues, Willie broke through with Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain, and Waylon’s greatest album was penned almost exclusively by Billy Joe Shaver. Heck, Johnny Paycheck’s big hit was a David Allen Coe song, and in turn David Allen Coe’s biggest song was a Steve Goodman tune. But in all of that work they were only being “Pat Boone” like?

So is Kris Kristofferson an artist when he does Me and Bobby McGee, whereas Janis Joplin is Pat Boone?

It seems that you’d like to put some mystical primacy on composition, but that seems to ignore the fact that, like M.C. said, the voice is an instrument and vocal performance is an art, and country music has recognized this as such for it’s entire history.

That being said…..
I think George Strait is country-ish, enough so to retain plausible deniability when being accused of completely abandoning the tradition, sanitized, consistent, and boring above all else. In other words, he is the perfect pick for “artist of the decade” for country music in the 2000’s

Three words: Frank F-ing Sinatra.

George Strait = Artist of the Decade. Cool.

Why does Reba always have to host the ACMs?? …

The Ben Nichols album is awesome(if you buy now, you get a digital copy right away). One of my favorite singers (if that’s what you can call his rasp) and one of my favorite authors… can’t go wrong there.

Well, I think Krauss is an immensely talented artist, but do you seriously think it would actually be possible to name her as the country artist of the decade? Most of her work has been bluegrass, which a fairlyy sizeable portion of country fans don’t listen to very much. She has had few hits on the country charts, and most of them have been in the form of duets for established country stars. I just don’t think it’s plausible for a purely country organization to do this… it would create a very strange response from a lot of country try charts, and most of them have been in the form of duets for established country stars. I just don’t think it’s plausible for a purely country organization to do this… it would create a very strange response from a lot of country fans and maybe even country singers.

It’s the “Academy of Country Music”… what I mean is that the ONLY musical genre it deals with is country. For them to pick an artist whose main work wouldn’t even be classified as country most of the time would just be odd.

And a lot of country fans don’t like “Americana” and the folk association it has to it. Folk music was everything country didn’t stand for back in the day.

i nominate daron norwood.

or cleve francis.

Things are very black and white in your world, Drew, I think…Folk=Red state; Country=Blue state.

too bad there’s so many of us who don’t fall so easily into those categories

I think you need to learn the roots of folk. From its creation through its peak it was fostered by left wing radicals.

Can you imagine something called “Peace Queer” on country radio? haha, no chance in hell that would get airplay.

I assume he just got the colors mixed up.

haha, could you imagine that?

The songwriting part of the argument is valid, that’s a big deal, especially considering the roots of country singer-songwriters. But because he doesn’t play the freakin’ guitar? Who gives a damn!

That dipshit doesn’t even play the guitar. I saw him on gac and he walked out, sat down with his guitar, sang, and never even touched a string. He damn sure doesn’t write his own songs. That’s not much of an artist.

“As a Canadian, I always mix those colours up; our Liberal Party uses red and our Conservative Party uses blue….dang ol’ cultural differences.”

I’ve always thought that your way makes a lot more sense.