Country music legend Alan Jackson was honored at the 56th gathering of the Country Music Association (CMA) awards ceremony Friday evening, rightfully earning a place in history with the Willie Nelson Lifetime Achievement Award.
Jackson was showered with love and regaled by his former hits by contemporary stars like Carrie Underwood, Dierks Bentley, Jon Pardi, and Lainey Wilson. The awards show was hosted by Luke Bryan and Peyton Manning.
Speaking to the live and television audiences, a humbled Jackson recounted that his entire life has been blessed. He thanked God for answering his prayers and his wife of forty-two years for standing by his side.
“Country music has been real good to me and I fell in love with it when I was a young man,” Jackson said. “I really love the instruments, the steel guitars and the fiddles and things like that that gave it such a unique character to me and made it its own. And I love the lyrics and the songs and the artists and the melodies and the harmonies.”
“It’s just a real American music to me,” he punctuated.
Jackson noted that he initially arrived in Nashville “with nothing” before jokingly adding that “Carrie [Underwood] is talking about three chords and the truth and mine was like three chords and prayer. And God answered that prayer, a little bit.”
After touching the audience with humility and self-deprecating humor, Jackson then acknowledged his blessings in life. It was a team effort, both professionally and personally.
"*" indicates required fields
“As my mama would say, I’m so blessed. I’ve had a great team around me my whole career that have helped me, great songwriters. I’ve been so fortunate to have all that to help me get this far. I can’t thank everybody who’s been in my life all these years,” he stated, before hammering home how important family has been. “[B]ut I do have to say thanks to my wife Denise, over there somewhere. We started out as teenagers… I’m probably not always the easiest person to love, but she’s been there and helped me through hard times. And we’ve shared great times. The good, the bad, the happy, and the sad, we’ve survived a lot. I just want to thank her because she’s held me up all these years and she’s my best friend. And she gave me a wonderful family over there.”
Jackson continued his remarks, highlighting the amazing opportunities found uniquely in America.
“I’ve definitely lived the American dream,” he said. “And I’m still living that honky tonk dream.”
Fox News wrote that the Lifetime Achievement Award is a relative newcomer to the CMAs. Although that awards ceremony has been running continuously since the 1960s, only more recently did they include this particular recognition.
Instituted in 2012, the Willie Nelson Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes artists who have gained the highest degree of recognition in country music and have positively impacted and contributed to the growth of the genre.
Nelson, Kenny Rogers, Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, Kris Kristofferson, Charley Pride and Loretta Lynn have previously received the honor.