MUMBAI: American singer, prolific songwriter and five-time Grammy winner Chris Stapleton nearly swept the CMA Awards with four trophies in Nashville, Tennessee, on Wednesday night (U.S. Central Standard Time), but the Country Music Association reserved its top prize for Luke Combs, reports 'Variety'.

"(Presenter) Alan Jackson said my name twice just now," marvelled Combs, accepting the Entertainer of the Year period as the telecast slipped across the three-hour point. "I have never written a speech for something like this, which is not serving me very well right now ... I don't deserve to win it, but I'm sure as hell glad that I did," he added.

Earlier in the night, he had premiered a brand new song, 'Doin' This'. It was Combs' second shot at Entertainer of the Year; last year he lost it to Eric Church. The 31-year-old's 2020 album, 'What You See is What You Get', topped charts across multiple territories.

"The show had its winners largely falling along predictable lines -- except for Combs' entertainer win, which was a matter of some suspense, and Carly Pearce winning female vocalist for the first time -- but the telecast took the road less taken with some of its socially conscious performance spots," writes 'Variety'.

Mickey Guyton was definitely making a statement when she sang her recent album track 'I Love My Hair', joined by fellow Black artists Brittney Spencer and Madeline Edwards. 'I Love My Hair', which Guyton said in a tweet was "a song of self-acceptance", was introduced by Faith Fennidy, a Black student in Louisiana who was sent home from school after being told her braids violated school policy, an incident that inspired Guyton to write the song.

(Source: IANS)