Sophia Michaels
The 2022 CMA Awards kicked off their 56th annual broadcast with a salute to a fallen icon. Reba McEntire, Carrie Underwood, and Miranda Lambert all took the stage to celebrate the legacy of Loretta Lynn, who died Oct. 4 at age 90.
Underwood began the performance, delivering “You Ain’t Woman Enough (To Take My Man).” Lambert, Underwood’s onetime duet partner on 2014’s “Somethin’ Bad,” emerged next to sing “Don’t Come Home a-Drinkin’ (With Lovin’ on Your Mind).” And McEntire, who was recently forced to postpone shows after going on vocal rest, sauntered out last to sing “You’re Looking at Country.” The finale, of course, was all three vocalists each taking a verse of Lynn’s signature, “Coal Miner’s Daughter.”
Lynn was named the CMA’s Entertainer of the Year in 1972, an award announced by Minnie Pearl. “I’d like to say that I won a lot of awards, but this is one that I have been nominated for but I never did get,” Lynn said in a vintage clip from that ceremony. “I’m happy, but I’m kinda sad about it because my husband is gone hunting. He couldn’t make it back in to share my happiness with me.”
Lynn’s last nomination came in 2011 for Musical Event of the Year, alongside Miranda Lambert and Sheryl Crow, for a collaboration on “Coal Miner’s Daughter.”
