CMA 50 - A Look Back - 1968

The first year the CMA Awards were televised was 1968. NBC broadcast the show and Kraft was its sponsor. It used to be that October was country music month -- it was decreed throughout promos for the show:  "October is country music month." Today country music month is...ehh, whenever. 

The commercials between the performances and the award-handing featured a honey-voiced announcer extolling the fun, warm family desserts one could make with Kraft caramels. Ahh, caramel apples, crackly leaves of burnished orange dusting the sidewalks, the kids skipping home from school, greeted at the door with a tender hug from Mom.

Dad nursing a whiskey sour in his easy chair; Mom, her arms crossed, nursing time-worn resentments. The kids huddled in their rooms cranking their radios up loud to muffle the inevitable screaming match to come.

Oh, maybe that was just my house. 

Is it any wonder I wrapped my head and arms around the CMA's?

Before 1968, the only awards shows on TV were the Emmys and the Oscars. Today, pick a week and you'll find one or two statuette grabfests to suit your tastes. "Winning an award" is a mundane exercise. Shoot, I bet I've even won an award for something and I don't even know it (I'm thinking I probably sent my "representative" to scoop it up for me.)

Forty-eight years of televised CMA's has wrought some changes. There's no longer a category for Comedian of the Year or Instrumental Group. Vocal Group used to encompass not only groups but duos. Frankly there weren't that many vocal groups making records in 1968.

And we (okay, I) think today's music reeks? Take a gander at the nominees (and winners) of the various awards in '68:

Album of the Year

Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison - Johnny Cash

By The Time I Get To Phoenix - Glen Campbell

D-I-V-O-R-C-E - Tammy Wynette

Gentle on My Mind - Glen Campbell

The Best of Merle Haggard - Merle Haggard

Female Vocalist of the Year

Tammy Wynette

Lynn Anderson

Loretta Lynn

Dolly Parton

Jeannie C. Riley 

Male Vocalist of the Year

Glen Campbell

Eddy Arnold

Johnny Cash

Merle Haggard

Charley Pride

Single of the Year

Harper Valley PTA - Jeannie C. Riley

By The Time I Get To Phoenix - Glen Campbell

D-I-V-O-R-C-E - Tammy Wynette

Folsom Prison Blues - Johnny Cash

Honey - Bobby Goldsboro

Song of the Year

Honey - Bobby Russell (sorry, but one of the worst songs ever written)

D-I-V-O-R-C-E - Bobby Braddock and Curly Putman

Harper Valley PTA - Tom T. Hall

Little Green Apples - Bobby Russell (Is this guy gunning for the title of worst songwriter ever?)

Skip a Rope - Glen Douglas Tubb and Bobby Moran 

Vocal Group of the Year

Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton

The Stoneman Family

Archie Campbell and Lorene Mann (?)

Bill Anderson and Jan Howard

Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash

Entertainer of the Year

Glen Campbell

Eddy Arnold

Johnny Cash

Merle Haggard

Charley Pride 

FYI - the Instrumental Group of the Year was the Buckaroos (richly deserved) and the Comedian of the Year, if anyone cares, was Ben Colder (I guess you had to be there).

So, if we're (okay I'm) appalled by Beyonce performing on the 50th anniversary show, in 1968 we were appalled (appalled!) by Glen Campbell, who wasn't country, walking away with the biggest awards of the night.

I like Glen Campbell a whole lot -- now. I think Glen Campbell is a national treasure. That doesn't negate the fact that By The Time I Get To Phoenix wasn't country. It was...I don't know...easy listening, I guess. It sucked.

And don't even get me started on that musical blemish, "Honey". Oh. My. God. Horrible, horrible song.

Hindsight, though, is omniscient. Of course we know now that Tammy and Merle and...I guess that's about it from the above list...are majestic. Merle would have his day, and his arms full of awards, in 1970. Tammy started a long run in '68 that flowed into subsequent years. Porter and Dolly were royalty -- Dolly still is.

But if you can stand the cringe-worthiness, let's take a close look back, shall we?

(She was kinda dumb and kinda smart.)

For pure kitsch:

Here's some royalty:

Not to give 2016 short shrift, here's, I'm guessing, the best performance of the night:

Forty-eight years. A lot has changed and a lot hasn't. Talent is talent. The cool thing of the moment isn't cool at all.

I've suddenly got a craving for some Kraft caramels.

2015 CMA Awards - Or, Who Is Chris Stapleton?

I don't watch 'em, because I don't know who anybody is anymore. Sure, I know who Brad Paisley is, and I know who Carrie Underwood is, but other than that? Apparently, I'm fully ensconced in the twentieth century and a hundred years have passed me by.

I still read about 'em, though, because old habits die hard. I'm probably hoping to catch a glimpse of George Strait, who's retired, actually. We're not in the nineties anymore?

It's my own fault for not listening to country radio, but funny story -- I was laid back in the dentist's chair the other day and country was blaring from the (apparently hygienist's favorite) channel, and I thought, well, here's an opportunity to catch up on what I've missed, since I have no choice but to lie here and allow a stranger to chisel my teeth.

I didn't recognize anyone's voice except for Brad Paisley's, because the DJ played "Mud On The Tires", apparently during his oldie spotlight. To be honest, Brad Paisley is, to me, not even an oldie. When I stopped listening to country in 2001, he was a new up-and-comer. I knew the song about fishing, but that was the extent of my BP awareness. I may have recognized his voice, also, because he actually has a recognizable voice.

Throughout the course of my sociological experiment, I may have pinpointed one of the problems I have with "new" country (aside from the fact that it isn't country). I was curious about that, honestly.  It's not that I don't want to listen to music -- good heavens, no! I've loved music, or been in love with music my whole life. I'm a pretty reliable encyclopedia of music, actually. And I'm open-minded. In fact, I'm considering giving it another go -- perhaps tuning my radio to the "country" station at work one day and enduring an hour (maybe) of today's hits -- because I have to get a handle on this.

But what struck me, in the dentist's chair, was the artists' apparent fear of singing. Everything was staccato. Lots of words, no breath in between. That's not how Tammy Wynette did it. In fact, her grace note was that long-held crescendo at the end of the song. Do today's artists have no breath control? Are they heavy smokers? Singing should be...singing. Not "speaking". Anyone can speak. If that was the bar, I could just sit here and spout words out loud and I would have absolutely no need to listen to music.

And it's not like the words they're morse-coding are relevatory. They're not like, "Today I Started Loving You Again". What I got out of it was a lot of bitching (women) or body drooling (men).

So, obviously, the highlight of my CMA video recap was this:

(FYI - Kenny Chesney in the audience - cheer up! Garth and Trisha are having fun!)

So, this guy, Chris Stapleton, is, I guess, the new phenom. I could say, Johnny Paycheck, Charlie Rich, et al. But that would date me, I suppose. This also is not country, but it's better. I don't hate it. Maybe country has a future after all.

Not that it's going to turn me into a new country fanatic. Nashville is going to need to do better than that. But still:

This might spur "singers" to actually "sing". If for no other reason than the bottom dollar. I do like, however, that somebody, somewhere, has a modicum of music pride.

So, there you go -- 2015 -- CMA's.

The rest of the show might have been great. I don't know; I go to bed at 8:00. I have an early alarm.

But ask me about the 1970 CMA's, or even the 1973's. I could regale you forever. But those recaps would actually feature "singing".

Weird, twentieth-century concept.