David Bruce Murray
Jan 18, 2010
Announcements|Fan Awards|Singing News
New Location/Date For 2010 Fan Awards
The Southern Gospel Music Association and Singing News announced today that the 2010 Fan Awards presentation will move to Dollywood on September 29, 2010. The announcement also indicated that the SGMA Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony will be merged with the Fan Awards.
I’m sure there will be an outcry, because the event is no longer going to be held during the National Quartet Convention. Personally, I don’t care that much. I’m always interested in finding out who won, but I have only made the effort to attend the presentation once. After that, I actively avoided attending NQC on Thursday, and I was glad to see the event moved to Saturday in recent years.
I’m not sure if moving the event away from NQC entirely is a good move or not, but Dollywood is probably the next best thing. The biggest disadvantage to moving the Fan Awards away from NQC is that the nominated artists will be less likely to be in attendance. I think it might have been better to move the awards to an afternoon showcase rather than separating from NQC entirely. Of course, the other major issue will be fan attendance. I’m not sure what the capacity of the theater is at Dollywood, but I’m sure it’s a far cry from 17,000.
The biggest advantage to the move is the merger with the SGMA Hall Of Fame Induction Ceremony. On paper, a hall of fame induction should be the greater honor, since it’s a once-in-a-lifetime event. Putting the two together make sense, and to a degree, increases the logic of moving the event to Dollywood. When results are determined by fans, the honor goes to momentary popularity. You have to really dominate a category or multiple categories for several years before a Fan Award starts to percolate to the same level as a Hall Of Fame induction…again on paper. Putting the two together offers a unified front rather than having two events competing for recognition, and I think that’s a good thing…at least for the SGMA.
The biggest question that remains to be answered is whether or not this move will hurt Singing News. If voting is a big part of the reason people who go to NQC subscribe, I could see at least a few dropping their subscriptions now that they won’t be attending the presentation at Dollywood.




