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Luke Combs: What He Said About CMAs Over The Years

Author Nancy Brooks // Country Writer, Beasley Media Group

Luke Combs goes into tomorrow night’s CMA Awards with five nominations, including a nod for the top category of Entertainer of the Year, an award he has already won from the CMA twice.

There’s a good chance he will walk away a winner on Wednesday night (11/8). In 2021, before he scored his first Entertainer of the the Year win, he told us about the possibility of winning such a big honor. He said, “Being nominated for Entertainer of the Year is unbelievable. So it’s the top award in our business and our genre, so I think everybody that gets nominated wants to win.”

He added at the time, “I know I would love to win at some point, and if that’s this year or five years from now, I know, but just being nominated is awesome and something that I definitely don’t take for granted.”

Luke said after winning ETOTY from presenter Alan Jackson, “I am at a loss for words. Alan Jackson said my name… twice! I honestly don’t know what to say. I want to thank everybody in this room, the fans, every artist in this room.”

He added, “Every person nominated deserves to win this award. I don’t deserve to win it, but I am sure as hell glad I did.”

RELATED: Luke Combs’ Wife: ‘The Best Thing’ She’s Ever Done


A year earlier, in 2020, Combs was nominated for the award but did not win; that year, the honor went to Eric Church. Luke won Album of the Year and Male Vocalist in 2020. Backstage after his wins that year, Luke talked about his hero, Church, winning the top honor. He said, “I was pumped to see Eric win Entertainer tonight. Without him, there’s no me. I think no one has ever deserved anything more than he deserved to win that trophy tonight. As much as I wanted to win, I couldn’t have been more excited for him too.”

The 2023 CMA Awards will be broadcast live on ABC TV and will be given out starting at 8 PM ET. Luke is slated to perform on the show.

2023 CMA Album Nominees Luke, Lainey, Kelsea and More

  • Lainey Wison - Bell Bottom Country

    This won the 2023 Album of the Year award at the ACM Awards in May and is a hot contender for this award from the CMA. Lainey said when she heard about this nomination and her eight others this year, “Being nominated in each of these categories amongst my friends means the world to me. And the coveted Entertainer Of The Year category?! It’s absolutely surreal. We bust our butts out there on the road every dang night to give y’all the best show possible, and I have the time of my life doing it. All I gotta say is thank y’all. I love country music.”

  • Luke Combs - Getting Old

    Getting Old is a continuation of his 2022 CMA Album of the Year winner Growin’ Up. Luke told us how the two albums connect, “All the songs that were on Growin’ Up and the songs that are now on this one, Getting Old, were all recorded in the same era. And what I mean by that is we were in the studio a bunch and recording what was then going to be my third album. I began to compile this list of songs; we must have recorded forty (songs) over two years.”

    He continued, “As I began to compile the track list that was going to be ‘Growin’ Up,’ I was having so much trouble coming up with this track list because there were two sets of songs that were so different from each other. I thought, ‘Well, I’ve got this song called ‘Growin’ Up and Getting Old,’ which the hook was ‘in the middle of growing up and gettin’ old,’ and that is really where I feel like I am.”

  • Ashley McBryde - Lindeville

    When Ashley got a Grammy-nominated for the same album, she told us, “I’m so proud to be able to share these nominations with so many friends and collaborators – for a duet we wrote and took to No. 1 with Carly and the entire cast of Lindeville, where we gave ourselves the opportunity to change the approach and make decisions based solely on serving the songs.” She added, “I’ve always said that recognition from the Recording Academy and joining the Grand Ole Opry are the two best things that could ever happen to you as an artist, so here I stand just in awe of this moment. It’s such an honor to be right here right now. And especially in such good company.”

  • Kelsea Ballerini - Rolling Up The Welcome Mat

    Just minutes after she learned of the nomination in early September (9/7), Ballerini was on her Insta Stories in a raw video clip she made on her phone. An emotional Kelsea, who appeared to be lying on the floor in her home, said, “Hey, good morning. um, CMA nominations came out this morning.” She pauses and smiles, “Rolling Up The Welcome Mat is nominated for Album of the Year. It’s the little EP that keeps on giving. Oh, my little heart’s gonna explode and implode at the same time. I am also nominated for Female Vocalist of the Year and Album of the Year at the CMAs. Good morning!” Ballerini then posted the announcement from the CMA of Album of the Year on her Insta Stories and wrote over it, “Nah, I’ll never get over this!”

  • Morgan Wallen - One Thing At A Time

    This album has been huge for Morgan and could very well win the award on Wednesday (11/8). It set a record in all genres of music when, in the week of the album’s release, all 36 tracks entered the Billboard Hot 100, breaking the record set by Drake in 2018 for most songs by an artist on the chart at one time, as well as the record for most debuts on the chart, with 27.

    Wallen said of the album when it came out in March, “This record represents the last few years of my life, the highs and the lows. It also brings together the musical influences that have shaped me as an artist – country, alternative, and hip-hop. There are 36 songs on this album because we just kept exploring with fresh lyrics, music, and production ideas, and these are the songs that felt right to me. It was a blast to create, and I was so grateful to be back in the studio to lay this out for my fans.”

Nancy Brooks has been working in the country music industry for almost 30 years. She has interviewed pretty much any country star you can think of. In the late 1990s, she started working with Dolly Parton. And yes, Nancy reports that Parton is as sweet as you would think. She loves her life in country music and has been backstage at every CMA Awards show since the late 1990s. Many of her stories are from her one-on-one interviews. She was there at the beginning of the incredible careers of many music superstars today, including Taylor Swift, Shania Twain, and Blake Shelton, and has interviewed them multiple times throughout the years.

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Author Nancy Brooks // Country Writer, Beasley Media Group
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