If Morgan Wallen watched the 2024 CMA Awards on TV last week, for most of the show, he probably felt he’d made the right decision to stay away from the proceedings at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville. He lost six awards in a row, including male vocalist, single and song of the year. The night was shaping up to be a replay of the 2022 CMA Awards, where he went 0-2 or the 2023 show, where he went 0-3. Voters, it seemed, were reluctant to honor an artist who had been caught on video using a racial slur.
Then Jeff Bridges came onstage to present the evening’s final award. This time, Wallen won. Bridges mispronounced Wallen’s last name, but that clumsy move didn’t change the fact that Wallen had just won the biggest award in country music – and he wasn’t there to accept it.
Suddenly, Wallen’s decision to stay away looked very different. He had just been received an award that has gone to many of the greatest country stars of the past six decades –…