Academy of Country Music Awards 2021: Mickey Guyton make history as first Black woman to host ACM Awards
In the wake of making history as the first Black solo female artist to acquire a Grammy nomination in a country music category, Mickey Guyton’s star is going to rise much further.
On Sunday, Guyton have make history again as the first Black woman to host the Academy of Country Music Awards, alongside Keith Urban, airing 8 p.m. Eastern on CBS.
“My hopes are to bring positive light and love and acceptance to this job,” Guyton told NBC News.
In spite of the fact that Sunday will check Guyton’s first time hosting an awards show, she guarantees a decent performance and several outfit changes. She noticed that having the support of co-host Urban while planning for the show has demonstrated to be fun and significant.
“You know, Keith Urban is from Australia and he had an affinity for country music,” she said. “I’m sure when he first started he wasn’t getting the most welcoming arms and now he’s here. He’s using his platform to uplift me, and that means so much.”
Lately, country music has witnessed a cultural shift in terms of representation. With artists like Rissi Palmer, Jimmie Allen, Willie Jones and Kane Brown, numerous individuals are seeing that country artists don’t need to fit a specific form.
At the point when Lil Nas X’s “Old Town Road” began to acquire traction in 2019, the song reached No. 19 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart. Billboard at that point eliminated the single from Hot Country Songs due to it not fitting the genre, as indicated by Rolling Stone. At last, Billy Ray Cyrus joined Lil Nas X on the “Old Town Road” remix, and it went to No. 1 on Billboard Hot 100. “Old Town Road” never re-entered the country music chart.
This showed that country music, very much like the rest of the world, has far to go to completely accept being inclusive.
“Well, a lot of people, especially today, are only seeing Lil Nas X or think that country music is just white guys, beers and trucks, and that is not the case,” Guyton said. “There’s all types of country music. There have been a lot of Black people in country music pounding the pavement for a very long time.”
Historically, Black artists have been pushed out of customarily white music spaces, regardless of whether they had a huge hand in making the music. Prior to Guyton, there was Linda Martell. Despite the fact that her commitments went to a great extent undetected, Martell discovered accomplishment with the arrival of “Color Him Father” in 1969, driving the route for the Black country artists who might come after her.
Guyton needs to keep on dispel outdated stereotypes and misconceptions by showing other aspiring Black artists that they can “sing country, pursue it and love it, too.”
Despite the barriers and discrimination she faces from pundits, Guyton stays the sweet down-home Southern young lady she’s constantly been.
Guyton sings as though she is talking straightforwardly to the individuals who have felt minimized — explicitly Black ladies.
“So often, we’ve grown up — especially young little Black girls who have grown up not loving themselves because we didn’t see ourselves in anything. Now we’re seeing ourselves,” she said.
Her passion for country music started in Texas when she was a little girl listening in to LeAnn Rimes, Whitney Houston, CeCe Winans and her untouched top choice, Dolly Parton.
Guyton said her admiration for Parton has just filled lately, especially after the star asked Tennessee officials in February not to raise a sculpture of her after they showed support for doing as such. Parton said the pandemic and the current social equity developments were more significant.
“I mean, Dolly Parton is a national treasure, an international treasure in my personal opinion, and she’s been preaching love and acceptance way before it was the thing to do,” Guyton said. “She loved her big boobs, and as much as people talk about that, she was like, ‘I am who I am and you’re going to take it or leave it,’ and she is that person to this day.”
“She really does stand by her truth, and she thinks that Black lives matter, and she is all things great and I just love her,” she added.
Guyton is conveying a similar weight of responsibility, serving in as a motivation to youthful fans who admire her and will watch her facilitating the ACM Awards on Sunday.
The message she needs to pass on to those fans — and every other person — when she graces the stage? Basically, she said, “We’re here.”
