Taylor Swift: Young, fearless and in control

The country-pop star wins Entertainer of the Year and three other prizes in a night dominated by up-and-comers.

In 1958, Johnny Cash released the song "Ballad of a Teenage Queen," the story of a pretty small-town girl who won Hollywood fame but gave it all up for the boy next door. In 2009 -- on Wednesday night, actually, in Nashville, at the annual Country Music Assn. Awards ceremony -- Taylor Swift updated and obliterated that story line.

The 19-year-old songwriter and universe-shifting star won in four categories, beating out mainstays such as Kenny Chesney and Keith Urban to claim country music for youth, femininity and pop. She also performed two numbers and was the subject of much running humor throughout the program, which found its spark whenever one of country's current batch of New Non-Traditionalists took the stage.

Swift started things out with a version of "Forever and Always" that was glitzy and high-concept -- and off-tune, a consistent characteristic of Swift's live outings that gave the lie to her one undeserved triumph, for best female vocalist. The prize should have gone to Carrie Underwood, country's most powerful young singer and the evening's co-host with Brad Paisley.

Struggling for her notes but not showing any concern about it, Swift made a flurry of arena-rock moves, shaking her long, gold tresses as if she were Robert Plant and sliding down a shiny pole in what seemed like a defiant nod toward her friend Miley Cyrus, who took guff for similar gyrations on this year's Teen Choice Awards. By the end of this production number, she owned the night. And she kept on owning it, right down to her tearful acceptance of the Entertainer of the Year prize, which she shared with her touring band and her fans, "and the shirts you made yourselves."

This week's on-sales: Brad Paisley, Jay-Z, Julian Casablancas and more

Staples Center

Brad Paisley, Feb. 19; Jay-Z, March 26 (Sat.)

Gibson Amphitheatre
Omid, Nov. 25 (now)

Downtown Palace Theatre
Julian Casablancas, Nov. 13 and 30 (now)

UCI Bren Events Center

Weezer, Jan. 11 (Sat.)

Brad Paisley earns six Country Music Association nominations [Updated]

[This version has been updated with more news on nominations.]

Brad Paisley leads the pack with six nominations for the 43rd Country Music Assn. Awards announced this morning, including entertainer of the year, male vocalist, album, single and song. Teenage country music sensation Taylor Swift joins Paisley and veterans Kenny Chesney, George Strait and Keith Urban vying for entertainer of the year, the CMA’s top trophy.

Swift, Strait and relative newcomers Jamey Johnson and Zac Brown are tied at four nominations apiece, reflecting an influx of new blood into the CMA honors. Strait’s nominations for entertainer, male vocalist, music video and music event give him a career total of 79, tying him with Alan Jackson for the most nominations in CMA history. Strait has won 22, more than any other artist.

Swift, 19, is the only woman in the entertainer competition and the first nominated since Faith Hill in 2000. Shania Twain is the last woman to win the category, in 1999. Swift recently surpassed total album sales of 10 million copies since the release of her debut album, “Taylor Swift,” in 2006. Her sophomore effort, “Fearless,” has sold more than 4 million copies.

CMA Awards: Carrie Underwood, Brad Paisley back as emcees

Music award season is upon us. The eligibility period for the 2010 Grammy Awards ends Monday, and today Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley were announced as returning hosts for the 2009 Country Music Assn. Awards. The CMAs will air live for the East Coast on Nov. 11 on ABC.

Underwood is reigning "entertainer of the year" champion at the rival Academy of Country Music Awards, breaking a lock that Kenny Chesney had on the category. She's also been named female vocalist of the year at the CMAs three years running, and Paisley has owned the male title for the last two years. All told, Paisley has 11 CMA trophies to his name, and Underwood five.

The CMAs are open to the public, and tickets will go on sale Sept. 19 via Ticketmaster. Tickets start at $110, not including surcharges, and top out at $382.50. The CMAs will once again be held at the Sommet Center in Nashville. Nominations for the 2009 awards will be announced in early to mid-September. A spokesman said details are "still being finalized" before the nomination date can be revealed.

While country has two major awards dedicated specifically to the genre, expect a larger Nashville presence to be felt throughout the entire 2009-10 music award season. Young star Taylor Swift may very well end up with 2009's top-selling album in "Fearless," and she's become a major part of MTV's current branding campaign for its upcoming Video Music Awards.

Country stars are a major presence on the charts these days. Reba McEntire holds the No. 1 album this week with her "Keep On Loving You"; last week, the top spot belonged to George Strait's "Twang," this week's No. 2 album. Last but not least, the Recording Academy is making a greater outreach than in years  past with its Grammy Awards. The group, as previously reported, will stage its first ever "Grammy Salute to Country Music" on Sept. 8 in Nashville, which will honor Vince Gill.

-- Todd Martens

Photo: Carrie Underwood at the 2009 Grammy Awards. Credit: Mark Boster / Los Angeles Times

Grammys getting cozy with country

OK, Nashville, is everything forgiven?

The Recording Academy will honor Vince Gill at its first ever "Grammy Salute to Country Music," slated for Sept. 8 in Nashville. Set to appear are Brad Paisley, wife Amy Grant, Alison Krauss, Steve Martin and Michael McDonald. The Recording Academy stages similar events for classical, jazz and gospel music.

"Vince Gill who has made an indelible mark on the genre," said Recording Academy chief Neil Portnow in a statement. "Our 'Salute To' series pays homage to and celebrates the work of extraordinary people and organizations that continue to ensure that these genres remain a vital part of our culture."

Gill has garnered 20 Grammy Awards in his 30-plus year career. He won best country album in 2007 for his four disc set "These Days," but lost out in the album of the year field that year to Herbie Hancock.

Grammy followers may remember that Gill passed on an opportunity to perform on the telecast in 2008. It's common practice for every album of the year nominee to perform on the Grammys, but Gill balked at the live scenarios presented to him that year, as they featured the county vet performing a duet with Paisley rather than showcasing his nominated album.

Nevertheless, Gill was a willing participant in the awards, appearing as a presenter in 2008. All the drama happened a few months after Portnow flew to Nashville to discuss a perceived lack of country representation on the awards.

Yet all should be forgiven now, as the Grammys this year featured performances by Taylor Swift and Sugarland, and a country-tinged album -- "Raising Sand" from Krauss and Robert Plant -- won the top prize.

Look for the country goodwill to continue into 2010, with Swift's "Fearless" sure to score a bounty of nominations. The Grammy eligibility period for the 2010 telecast will come to a close on Aug. 31, and nominations are expected to be announced in early December.

-- Todd Martens

Photo: Getty Images

Taylor Swift's lessons learned from Brad Paisley

Brad Paisley’s won over a lot of fans during the 10 years since he put out his debut album, and one of the biggest also happens to be the biggest-selling act in pop music of the past year, Taylor Swift.

Paisley invited her to be his opening act for his 2007 tour, giving many of his fans their first chance to see the teenage phenom in person.

“I’ll never forget my first big tour,” Swift told The Times by e-mail this week. “I was 16 when I got the call that Brad Paisley was offering to take me out as one of his opening acts on his Bonfires and Amplifiers Tour.

“I immediately started screaming," she recalled. "I had no idea how much I would learn from him over the next 10 months."

Among the revelations: he’s no skinflint.

“One of the first things that really caught my attention about Brad’s character is that I found out that he had gone out and bought my album in order to decide whether or not to offer me the tour,” Swift wrote.

 “He could’ve gotten a free copy from anyone, or just made the decision based on my single doing well at radio. He’s very meticulous, and wanted to make sure he was investing in the right artist.”

Apparently he’s also a pretty easy-going boss too. When Swift came down with a cold, causing her to cut one performance short, Paisley didn’t bat an eye.

Brad Paisley breaks the pattern

A patriot for changing times, Brad Paisley decides his music has room to grow and dives hat first into ‘American Saturday Night.’

In the decade since country singer Brad Paisley put out his debut album, the kid from Glen Dale, W.Va., has concocted a savvy musical amalgam of Roger Miller's songwriting wit, Buck Owens' hard-rocking twang and Chet Atkins' guitar wizardry. But there's powerful evidence of another influence at work in Paisley's music, one of the titans of American popular culture: Mark Twain. 

 Like Twain's youthful literary hero Tom Sawyer, Paisley frequently couples wisdom with a finely honed sense of humor, and appears to share Huck Finn's disenchantment with the emphasis that all those grown-ups around him place on becoming "sivilized." 

In hits such as "Online," "Celebrity" and "Ticks," he's proved to be a skillful sneak, slipping in the kind of clever ideas and wordplay that few of his peers at the top of the country sales charts dare to venture. He's tackled the subject of alcohol abuse from different vantage points in two hit songs, the whimsical "Alcohol" and the artistic punch to the gut "Whiskey Lullaby," his award-winningduet with bluegrass queen Alison Krauss.

Paisley's eighth album, "American Saturday Night," due out Tuesday, has the usual complement of straightforward love songs (the first single, "Then"), ruminations on love lost ("Oh Yeah, You're Gone") and humorous come-ons ("You Do the Math").

But what is likely to elevate Paisley's standing as a musician, both in and potentially outside of the Nashville music community, are two key tracks: the title song and "Welcome to the Future," both of which broach topics that also were favorites of Samuel Clemens.

Read the full story: Brad Paisley breaks the pattern

Related: Brad Paisley: Album by album

Stagecoach 2009: Day 1, by the numbers

Backstage at Stagecoach:

Saturday's opening of this weekend's Stagecoach country music festival drew a sellout crowd of 40,000, the biggest turnout yet for the 3-year-old event, Goldenvoice chief Paul Tollett said near the end of the day, which featured headliners Brad Paisley and Reba McEntire. There's good reason to expect that today's closing show, topped by Kenny Chesney and Kid Rock, will do every bit as well. Year in and year out, Chesney sells more concert tickets than virtually every other act in pop music.

In addition, arrests were down from last year's pace, according to Indio police spokesman Ben Guitron, with 14 arrests Saturday and three on Friday among those who had arrived early to set up in the adjacent campgrounds. Last year, when Stagecoach ran three days, Guitron said there were 80-plus arrests over the course of the event.

Saturday's results represented quite a turnaround for Stagecoach organizers and brought another dose of good news following the response to last weekend's three-day Coachella Music and Arts Festival. That event drew 160,000 total, the second-highest turnout in the decade-old festival's history.

Stagecoach 2009: Brad Paisley's class in Geek History

Brad Paisley’s wrong — he’s not cooler online.

In fact, the coolest thing about the singer, songwriter and guitarist is that he’s become one of country music’s biggest stars by fully embracing his inner nerd.

It wasn’t even all that inner during his headlining set at Stagecoach on Saturday night, the final stop — a belated hiccup, almost — on his Paisley Party Tour that formally ended in March.

His estimable string of hit singles encompasses a good percentage that reflect youthful awkwardness and the way that plays out for so many people in adulthood:  “I’m Just a Guy,” “Online” and “Letter to Me.” He writes and delivers them with such unforced wit and Everyman honesty, it’s understandable that he’s connected with a broad swath of country fans.

As it was stated so eloquently in the 1984 cinematic classic “Revenge of the Nerds,” when the head nerd went nose-to-nose with the top jock: “There are a lot more of us than there are of you.”

But what is still a bit surprising, in a good way, is that Paisley’s crafted hit after hit without sinking to lowest-common-denominator level of so much of what’s on country radio today. His lyrics are fresh, rife with brilliant twists (“I’m Gonna Miss Her [The Fishing Song]”), the occasional bawdy double-entendre (“Ticks”) and even profundity (“Whiskey Lullaby”). On top of that, he's one of the most dazzling guitarists ever to come down the pike, a worthy heir to the tradition of Chet Atkins, Jimmy Bryant, Albert Lee and Vince Gill.

ACM Awards: A big night for Carrie Underwood and Julianne Hough

Underwood takes entertainer of the year; Hough wins best new artist.

The 44th Academy of Country Music Awards swung political, personal, playful and patriotic on Sunday and ultimately opted for popular in bestowing its top honor on "American Idol" winner Carrie Underwood, naming her entertainer of the year over veteran male performers George Strait, Kenny Chesney and Keith Urban.

"I've had a lot of good moments in the past four years," the Oklahoma-born Underwood said at the climax of the three-hour event at the MGM Grand Arena, "but this one takes the cake."

The award was determined for the second year by popular vote during the show at CBS.com instead of being determined as it had been in past years by the performer who sold the most concert tickets during the previous 12 months, which would have given a fifth title to Chesney.

But the ACM, in striving to boost ratings and make the event more interactive for fans, opened the voting for entertainer and new artist to the public. That helped TV-friendly faces such as Underwood and former "Dancing With the Stars"-turned-country singer Julianne Hough, who took home the new artist trophy.

It was a big night as well for Internet-savvy teen phenom Taylor Swift, who sold more albums in 2008 than any other artist in any genre, passing 5 million. Her overwhelming success contributed to her sophomore album, "Fearless," which has topped 3 million since its release in November, being named album of the year.