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."
