Last weekend, BC held its own CMA awards show last night at the Vancouver’s Hard Rock Casino in the Molson Canadian Theatre. The 42nd Annual edition featured a special appearance from 2 time CCMA Female Artist of the Year, Meghan Patrick.
A lot of ribbing was done throughout the evening at some of the stereotypes. It started with the introduction of the night’s co-hosts!
The first set of awards were for individual performers of instruments in the Mike Normal All Star Band Categories.
- Bass – Matt Genereux
- Drummer – Seamus O’Neill
- Guitar – Ryan Stead
- Keyboard – Carly McKillip / Savard
- Steel / Dobro – Dave Barber (Drobo)
- Special Instrument – Philip Puxley (Banjo)
- Fiddle / Mandolin – Mike Sanyshyn (Fiddle)
Female Trio “The Heels” opened up with the first performance of the evening.
Country Club Act of the Year went to Rollin’ Trainwreck, also performed during the awards show. There was a good mix of upbeat music and antics as well as slower, more stripped down performances.
The big winners of the evening was Aaron Pritchett with
- Fan’s Choice of the Year
- Single of the Year
- Interactive Artist of the Year
- Male Artist of the Year
- Video of the Year
Aaron wasn’t able to attend the awards ceremony so his son, Jordan, took part in accepting the hardware. In tongue-in-cheek fashion (better than some of the writing for the presenters) Jordan cleverly indicated he was sure his dad would thank the likes of Dallas Smith on NOT being nominated in his categories! He also did a pretty good job at focusing on performing as part of Chris Buck’s band while some of the others strutted out on stage in RDNKN garb.
… pretty much the only Award Aaron didn’t win where he was nominated was Entertainer of the Year which went to Washboard Union. They also cleaned up last night with
- Songwriter of the Year (What We’re Made Of)
- Gaylord Wood Traditional / Roots Award
- Website of the Year
- Group/Duo of the Year
- Album of the Year
- Entertainer of the Year
… and like Aaron, virtually the only award they didn’t win was what Aaron won.
So many things can be converted into “Guitars”, such as lunchboxes and shovels … when you pioneer shovel playing and spend decades doing it an supporting the country music industry, you get inducted into the BC Country Music Hall of Fame with a shovel signed by pretty much everybody who is anybody to commemorate.
The Female Vocalist of the Year winner (for the 7th time), Karen-Lee Batten, was also one of the co-hosts of the show. Her performance of the Amanda Marshall cover of Let It Rain had everyone on their feet for a standing ovation before she was even done singing.
Female Vocalist of the Year Nominee (and former winner) Emily Taylor Adams also took to the stage to perform her single “If I Were A Drink”, which was also had her nominated for SOCAN Songwriter of the Year.
Meghan Patrick gave out the award for Female Vocalist of the Year … sat on a few panels over the weekend, and closed out the night with a performance of “Country Music Made Me Do It”
