Singing News Fan Awards revisited
Much has been made of the fact that Singing News has eliminated many categories in the Fan Awards. I must admit, I don’t really like the fact that the favorite Male Quartet, Mixed Quartet, Trio, Bass, Baritone, Lead, and Tenor awards were dropped. But I haven’t quite been able to find a way to express my feelings…until now.
Now I am not a sports fan, but many of you are. Just suppose that the rankings for favorite football team were eliminated. Suppose the rankings for best baseball team were eliminated. Suppose the rankings for best basketball team were eliminated. Instead, all the rankings were combined into one overall ranking, “best team.”
Wouldn’t that be much better? That way, rather than spreading the awards around into so many different categories, thereby diluting their impact, we could just point to one team and say that it was the best sports team in the United States.
But wait a minute, you might say. The different teams all play sports, but they do it in very different ways.
And that thought, applied to Southern Gospel, is my point precisely.
I was speaking of it highly...
Comment by Diana (January 31, 2007, 7:56 am)
Amen, brother!!! I am 100% with you on this one. It’s really a shame how they’ve chosen to reduce the number of categories. I’m really disappointed.
Comment by Bunny (January 31, 2007, 9:15 am)
I totally agree. I was looking forward to voting for the first time for my favorite singers and now that’s been taken away from me!
Comment by LSJ (January 31, 2007, 9:58 am)
I don’t know. It seems the sports analogy might be better applied to the whole of music rather than just one genre. Just like we have basketball, football, baseball, hockey, soccer, and bowling, we have Rock, Country, Heavy Metal, Gospel, Contemporary Christian, and Southern Gospel (irrespectively). So, with that view of the analogy, it seems silly having an award for just best “sport”, just as it would having an award for best “music genre”.
Perhaps a better analogy might be applied to Hollywood (etal) award shows (especially since my limited understanding and appreciation of sports requires me to seek another analogy): instead of having best actor, supporting actor, character actor, voice-over (Don LaFontaine, by the way), and animated character, we just choose best “person to make an appearance in any way in a film”.
I, too, am disappointed in the decision to limit the categories, but it will be interesting to see for whom people vote. All the quartet-lovers will vote for their favorite quartet; those who follow one group around all the time (as I know some fans to do–they see every possible concert their favorite artist does) will vote for them.
Comment by Clint Abbott (January 31, 2007, 11:13 am)
I agree that eliminating several of the awards stinks and I e-mailed Singing News and told them.
Comment by Jim T (February 1, 2007, 8:16 am)
I also emailed SN, but they won’t be confused with facts. They claim the artists support the decision, which I find hard to believe, and anyway, isn’t it the “fan” awards? One of the main reasons I go to NQC is this program, and with it essentially being killed I am certain there will be a negative effect on their already sinking attendance. I realize NQC and SN are seprate organizations, but NQC could apply some pressure. Every fan should contact SN about this.
Comment by Gladys Perry (February 2, 2007, 8:48 pm)
I agree with you 100%, Daniel. For whatever reasons, Singing News does not care about the opinion of their readers. They took away the “important awards”. For what reason, we’ll never know. I also emailed them my thoughts.
Daniel, thanks so much for all your great topics. I am so happy you did the interview with Ernie. It was great!