Trace Adkins & Kristin Chenoweth

Trace Adkins will return as host of the second annual American Country Awards, this time joined by Tony Award winner Kristin Chenoweth. The ACAs will air live from Las Vegas on Monday, December 5 at 8 p.m. ET on Fox and are the only country music awards show that is fan voted in both traditional categories and previously unrecognized areas such as touring.

Last year’s inaugural ACAs last year featured performances by Trace Adkins, Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan, Easton Corbin, Alan Jackson, Toby Keith, Rascal Flatts, Reba, Blake Shelton, Steel Magnolia, Josh Turner, The Band Perry and Uncle Kracker. Laura Bell Bundy, Rodney Carrington, Jeff Dunham, Travis Pastrana, Jaron and The Long Road to Love, Jewel, Lady Antebellum, Jennette McCurdy, Bret Michaels, Ty Murray, Jerrod Niemann, Michael Waltrip and Lee Ann Womack also appeared.

Nominees, performers and presenters for this year’s show will be announced at a later date. Browse photos from last  year’s show >>

Trace just released his latest album, Proud to Be Here. Read our review >>

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Country music stars sure love Twitter! Here at GAC, we follow them too. This week, Jewel revels in being a new mom, Billy Currington and Kellie Pickler contemplate their summer tans, Josh Thompson runs into Ronnie Dunn and Kip Moore suffers a ‘disappointment’ at the airport. Here are our picks for the Top 10 Country Tweets Of The Week.

Charlie Daniels – @CharlieDaniels: Well at least part of the time

Blake Shelton – @BlakeShelton: Well it may not come as a surprise but I’m floating around on Lake Texoma fishing to celebrate this special #1 over all album…But I wanted to hop on here and say thank you all for this incredible day and unmatched support new and old!!!!! I love y’all… Really. Continue Reading

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LOS ANGELES, CA - FEBRUARY 13: Rodeo rider Ty Murray and singer Jewel arrive at The 53rd Annual GRAMMY Awards held at Staples Center on February 13, 2011 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Jason Merritt/Getty Images)

People magazine reports that Jewel and her husband, professional bull rider Ty Murray, welcomed a son, Kase Townes Murray, on Monday evening in Texas. Kase arrived at 7 p.m. Central and weighed 7 lbs., 6 oz.

“Ty and I are so pleased to welcome our new baby boy into the world,” Jewel tells People. “We are overcome with happiness – it really is as great as everyone told us it would be – better even!”

Jewel’s pregnancy journey hasn’t been an easy one. The singer, 36, had struggled to conceive – and then in March, when she was five months pregnant, she was hit by a fire truck. Continue Reading

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Country music stars sure love Twitter! Here at GAC, we follow them too. Tonight we’re giving you a special GRAMMY version of Top 10 Tweets of the Week. And yes, there are way more than 10 — but there were so many good ones we didn’t want to stop! Here are our picks for the Top 10 Country Tweets Of The Week , GRAMMY style, starting with a cool photo of multi-GRAMMY winners Lady Antebellum on the red carpet. Here’s a little bit of what the stars tweeted during the GRAMMYS. Don’t forget to check out our GRAMMY wrap-up HERE!

Lady Antebellum on the red carpet at the 2011 GRAMMY Awards. Photo courtesy of Lady Antebellum/Twitter.com/ladyantebellum.

Laura Bell Bundy:  @LauraBellBundy    And @blakeshelton that was the sweetest intro I’ve ever seen. Those are gonna be talented and pretty babies!

Laura Bell Bundy:  @LauraBellBundy   @Miranda_Lambert that’s my girl!!! So raw, emotional and beautiful

The Band Perry:  @thebandperry    Beautiful @Miranda_Lambert , as always.

Emily West:  @emilywestmusic    Miranda. You are a beautiful flower tonight. Sing that song, girl…. It’s gonna win.

Little Big Town:  @LBTmusic    @martinamcbride you just looked and sounded amazing. So proud of you girl! KF

Jewel:  @jeweljk    Wow- loved the Aretha tribute- u guys?

Terri Clark:  @TerriClarkMusic    Ga ga has gone from a meat dress to a chicken getting ready to hatch – i want some of whatever she’s on…

Laura Bell Bundy:  @LauraBellBundy    Holy Fashion police! I have seen some doozy’s tonight! #grammy’s Continue Reading

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Miranda Lambert photo courtesy of Sony Music Nashville. Lady Antebellum photo courtesy of Capitol Nashville.

The 53rd Annual GRAMMY® Awards will take place in Los Angeles at the Staples Center on Sunday, Feb. 13, 2011, and will air live on CBS from 8–11:30 p.m. (ET/PT). This year, country music has a pretty big presence on the show. Here are our Top 5 reasons to watch:

Miranda Lambert will be making her first-ever performance on a GRAMMY® telecast. Also look for a performance from Album of the Year nominees, Lady Antebellum. Plus, although she won’t be singing a country song, Country Strong star and Academy Award® winner Gwyneth Paltrow will be singing with Cee Lo Green, whose song “Forget You” was sung by Gwyneth on an episode of the TV show Glee.

Current three-time GRAMMY® nominee Dierks Bentley and current nominee Blake Shelton will both present awards, as will winner and current four-time nominee Zac Brown and three-time winner and current nominee Keith Urban.

We’re really looking forward to the tribute to Aretha Franklin.What’s the country connection, you ask? Our own Martina McBride will be honoring the Queen of Soul with her powerful voice. Martina joins Yolanda Adams, Christina Aguilera, Jennifer Hudson and Florence Welch in the tribute.

In other related news, this Friday, Feb. 11, nominee LeAnn Rimes will take part in honoring Barbara Streisand, who’s getting the 2011 MUSICARES® Person of the Year Award. Legendary artist (and Barbara’s co-star in the movie A Star Is Born) Kris Kristofferson will present the award to her. Also, country/Americana producer T Bone Burnett was honored Feb. 8 by the The Producers & Engineers Wing® of The Recording Academy® for his commitment to excellence and ongoing support for the art and craft of recorded music.

Who’s gonna win? See the list of country nominees below and tell us your predictions! For a complete list of country, bluegrass and Americana nominees, visit Grammy.com.

We can’t wait to see what the stars will be wearing on the red carpet. Check back with us Monday morning (Feb. 14) to read our GRAMMY® wrap-up story and see photos from the big night! In the meantime, check out our red carpet photos from last year HERE.

2011 GRAMMY® AWARD NOMINEES:

Album of the Year
The Suburbs – Arcade Fire
Recovery – Eminem
Need You Now – Lady Antebellum
The Fame Monster – Lady Gaga
Teenage Dream – Katy Perry Continue Reading

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Jewel and Ty Murray at the 2010 ACA Awards. Photo courtesy of twitter.com/jeweljk.

Today, Jewel and husband Ty Murray told People magazine they’re having a boy. They announced the pregnancy — their first child — on Jan. 11.

“We would have been happy either way, of course, but we are so excited to be having a little boy,” Jewel tells People.com. Continue Reading

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Country music stars sure love Twitter! Here at GAC, we follow them too. Dierks Bentley‘s week was red hot, in spite of Nashville’s freezing temperatures. He met Lady Antebellum‘s Charles Kelley for a drink and when he left, he found his car on fire! Also, judging from this week’s tweets, country has gone to the dogs — literally! Several stars tweeted pictures of their incredibly cute pups. Here are our picks for the Top 10 Country Tweets Of The Week.

Charles Kelley & Dierks Bentley photo courtesy of Dierks Bentley.

Dierks Bentley:   @DierksBentley  met my friend charles kelley at a bar. he wanted to see my new ’67 camero [sic]. we walked back outside. it was on fire. not cool.

Dierks Bentley:   @DierksBentley   some footage from last night. hard to sleep w images of flames coming out from under the engine stuck in head. (Editor’s note:  Click here for a “fire report” from Dierks and Charles.)

Sarah Buxton:  @sarahbuxton    @DierksBentley I was next door @whiskey kitchen w Cassady, some dude told us about your flaming camero! [sic] I thought he was joking! Guess not!

Photo courtesy of twitter.com/juliannehough.

Julianne Hough:  @juliannehough    This is what I wake up to every morning… I’m a lucky girl!! Continue Reading

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Jewel and Ty Murray at the 2010 ACA Awards. Photo courtesy of twitter.com/jeweljk.

Congrats to singer/songwriter Jewel and her husband, rodeo star Ty Murray, who are having a baby! Jewel announced the happy news to People magazine, after finding out she was pregnant on the set of her new job as co-host of the Bravo reality show, Going Platinum. She’s now in her second trimester.

“I took a pregnancy test and it was positive!” Jewel, 36, tells People.com. “It was so hard to keep it a secret. I was worried I’d start throwing up on set and everyone would be like, ‘Oh, she’s pregnant.’ ” Continue Reading

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Gwyneth Paltrow & Tim McGraw from the upcoming movie, Country Strong, in theaters January 7, 2011. Photo by Scott Garfield, courtesy of Sony Pictures USA & Monarch Publicity.

From Crazy Heart to Country Strong, Hollywood and Nashville were tightly linked in 2010.

Tim McGraw, Julianne Hough, Trace Adkins and Carrie Underwood all went in front of the cameras. And artists as diverse as Ryan Bingham, Billy Currington, Taylor Swift and Kenny Chesney got their music on the big screen in one way or another.

Country’s role in a large number of movies ranks No. 7 in GAC’s countdown of the dozen top stories of 2010.

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Taylor Swift photo courtesy of Big Machine Records.

At the beginning of 2010, Taylor Swift walked away with four Grammy Awards, including the Album of the Year honor for Fearless. But when the 53rd annual Grammy nominees were unveiled Wednesday night, Taylor’s name was nowhere to be found among the 109 categories.

Stunning? A little, though not entirely. For starters, the eligibility period runs Sept. 1, 2009 through Sept. 30, 2010. Her new album, Speak Now, didn’t come out until late October, so that project is ineligible. “Fearless” and “Mine” were both released as singles, and she had a couple of titles on the Valentine’s Day soundtrack, and any of those could have potentially found a space on the Grammy list. But they didn’t.

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