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American Music Awards

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The American Music Awards show is one of four annual major US music awards shows (the others being the Billboard Music Awards, the Grammy Awards, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony). The AMAs were created by Dick Clark in 1973 to compete with the Grammys after the move of that year's show to Nashville, Tennessee led to CBS picking up the Grammy telecasts after its first two in 1971 and 1972 were broadcast on ABC. Michael Jackson and Donny Osmond co-hosted the first award show with Rodney Allen Rippy and Ricky Segall. While the Grammys are awarded based on votes by members of the entertainment industry, the AMAs are determined by a poll of music buyers. The "big three" established awards shows (AMAs, Billboard Music Awards, and Grammys) compete for prestige and television ratings, with the Grammys nominally rewarding quality and both the AMAs and Billboard Music Awards rewarding popularity. Stories of artists being pressured to participate in one awards show over the other have been fodder for tabloid gossip and controversy.

The only other major difference between the Grammys and Billboard Music Awards is that the AMAs do not currently have an award for Best Single/Record but the Grammys and Billboard Music Awards do.

In 1996, the AMAs instituted a new award, Favorite Artist of the Year, which was awarded to Garth Brooks. Brooks gave a short speech essentially saying he didn't deserve the award in a year he didn't do anything, and left the award on the podium. The category was discontinued.

Since the establishment of the Billboard Music Awards in 1989, there have been instances where artists (such as The Dixie Chicks and Céline Dion) have won all of the "big three" major music awards (including the AMAs). But the need for a unified music awards system (on the mold of horse racing's Triple Crown) only complicates the competition between the AMAs and the other awards shows.

For the first decade or so, the AMAs had multiple hosts, each representing a genre of music. For instance, Glen Campbell would host the country portion (Campbell, in fact, has co-hosted the AMAs more times than any other host or co-host), while other artists would co-host to represent his/her genre. In recent years, however, there has been one single host.

From its inception in 1973 until 2003, the AMAs have been held in mid- to late-January, but were moved to November beginning in 2003 so as not to further compete with other major awards shows (such as the Golden Globe Awards and the Academy Awards).

The most American Music Awards belong to Alabama who have collected twenty-two awards. The record for a solo artist belongs to Whitney Houston, who has collected twenty.

The record for the most American Music Awards won in a single year is held by both Michael Jackson (for 1983's Thriller), and Whitney Houston (for 1993's The Bodyguard Soundtrack), each with 8 awards to their credit (including the Award of Merit, which both artists were awarded during their respective year).

Pop/Rock Category

Soul/R&B Category

Country Category

Rap/Hip-Hop Category

Adult Contemporary Category

Heavy Hetal/Hard Rock Category

Alternative Category

Dance Category

Latin Category

Inspirational Category

Soundtrack

Other Categories

American Music Awards by Year


U.S. Music Awards
Major Ceremonies
American Music Awards | Billboard Music Awards | Grammy Awards | Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony
Minor award ceremonies
Soul Train Music Awards | MTV Video Music Awards | Latin Grammy Awards | BET Awards | Teen Choice Awards | Radio Music Awards

External links

 

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.

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