| B-SIDES | ▼ Music Suburban Cowboy The 58th Academy of Country Music Awards will broadcast next year from Frisco. BY DANNY GALLAGHER O ne of the highest honors in country music — besides get- ting to perform at the Grand Ole Opry and getting your song in an episode of Yellow- stone — is coming back to town. The Academy of Country Music (ACM) announced on its official website that its 58th annual awards show will be held on May 11, 2023, at the Ford Center at the Star in Frisco. This will be the second time that the ACM Awards have been held in the DFW area. The 50th ACM Awards were held in 2015 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington. Next year’s awards show will also be the second time the ACMs will stream online on Ama- zon Prime instead of a TV network and the first time the Dallas Cowboys’ headquarters facility in Frisco will host an awards show. The ACM started streaming its annual awards show this year on Amazon’s stream- ing service and became the first major awards ceremony to stream on an online channel. The broadcast received an Emmy for Outstanding Technical Direction at this year’s Emmy awards. The move to Frisco was quite a surprise for longtime viewers of the ACMs. The Uni- versal Amphitheatre in Los Angeles hosted the country music awards show from 1991 to 2002. Various venues across Las Vegas have hosted the awards 17 times in the last 20 years. The exceptions were two perfor- mances in Nashville and the one at AT&T Stadium in 2015. That production was hosted by Blake Shelton and Luke Bryan, ac- cording to the ACM website. Gov. Greg Abbott issued a congratulatory message from his staff’s office to Frisco for be- ing named the ACM Awards’ host city in 2023. “Congratulations to the City of Frisco on being selected to host one of the biggest cel- ebrations of country music,” Abbott wrote. “Country music is a big part of the Texas brand and is deeply rooted in our state’s cul- tural traditions. I look forward to working alongside city leaders as they prepare to host and celebrate artists cherished by Tex- ans and people from across the world.” The 2023 awards will also be the first with 16 a new executive producer. Longtime pro- ducer R.A. Clark has been part of the annual ACM Awards since the 39th annual event in 2004, starting as a co-executive producer, ac- cording to the Internet Movie Database. Grammy Awards executive producer Raj Ka- poor will stand in for Clark next year. “The Academy is proud to extend our re- lationship with Amazon to once again de- liver the ACM Awards live to a global audience on Prime Video,” Academy of Country Music CEO Damon Whiteside said in a released statement. “The March 2022 show was a defining moment for the ACM and a huge step forward for country music, allowing audiences around the world to see their favorite artists perform live and be rec- ognized for their excellence. We can’t wait to take the show to a new level for fans with an exciting new venue and integrated part- nership with the Dallas Cowboys.” No names have been announced for host- ing duties or live performances at the May 2023 event. Country music icon Dolly Par- ton hosted the 2022 awards from Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas. The show included live performances from singers and groups like Kelly Clarkson, Eric Church, Chris Sta- pleton, Carrie Underwood, Luke Bryan and Tenpenny. Miranda Lambert won Enter- tainer of the Year at the 2022 ACM Awards; it was her 37th ACM award, setting a record for the most won by a single artist or group. The main ceremony will be broadcast on Amazon Prime, and Amazon’s other chan- nels will provide additional coverage from the red carpet on Amazon Fashion and Am- azon Music’s Twitch channel. Amazon an- nounced in an online statement that it aims to make the ACM Awards broadcast from Frisco a “360-degree, immersive, fan-first event for a global audience.” ▼ FESTIVALS PARTY CENTRO F CENTRO POPULAR FESTIVAL IS BACK WITH LATIN AND RAP ACTS INCLUDING CHAMILLIONAIRE AND JUICY J. BY ALEX GONZALEZ ort Worth’s Latin and hip-hop music festival, Centro Popular, will return on Aug. 6. And Lorenzo Zenteno, the festival’s founder, promises that the second iteration will be even better. The festival, which will take place at Wild Acre in Fort Worth, is for all ages. Tick- ets start at $60. Named after Zenteno’s mother’s old re- cord store in Fort Worth, Centro Popular held its inaugural festival last July at Wild Acre, making it the first large Latin music Chamillionaire is part of the lineup for Centro Popular. Bryan Bedder 1 Ethan Miller/Getty Images Maren Morris accepted the New Female Vocalist of the Year award during the 52nd Academy of Country Music Awards. festival in North Texas in 12 years. Having grown up in Fort Worth, Zenteno remains committed to creating a festival highlighting local acts, specifically Black and Latin musi- cians. “It’s important for me to have some form of a homegrown festival or event,” Zenteno says, “because to be honest with you, there’s never really been any festival that’s minority-based. It’s important for me to maintain and incorporate a strong Latin presence because that’s what it was originally built for. The long-term vision is to continue to include that talent, and mix it with national talent and to have that di- versity.” Last year’s festival boasted a lineup of Latin music icons Baby Bash, Frankie J and Chris Perez, as well as local acts such as xB- Valentine, Louie The Singer and Renizance. This year, the festival will include perfor- mances by Jui$e Leroy, Tum Tum, G.T. Garza, Demund Rogers and more. In addition to these local favorites, Zenteno has some pretty exciting national acts on the bill. Set to make an appearance is Flawless Real Talk, who competed on the first season of Netflix’s rapping reality com- petition series Rhythm & Flow. Long Beach rapper Kap G will also join this year’s lineup. Other rap legends scheduled to appear include DJ Paul and Juicy J of Three 6 Ma- fia. “I have a lot of love for Texas,” says Juicy J in an email. “I have a lot of friends and family in Texas. [Fans can expect] the great- est show ever.” Another rapper coming out of retirement is Houston’s Chamillionaire, best known for his 2006 hit “Ridin,’” produced by Dallas duo Play-N-Skillz, which topped the Bill- board Hot 100 chart. Chamillionaire retired from music in 2015 and began working for Los Angeles-based venture capital firm Up- front Ventures, putting rap aside in favor of entrepreneurship. Chamillionaire performed a rare set at this year’s Houston Rodeo, and while his first love is his hometown, DFW is a close second favorite to him. “The DFW area has always been very supportive to me since the beginning of my career,” Chamillionaire said in a press re- lease, “so I’m excited to perform in front of real day one supporters. The energy is al- ways better in Texas.” After working behind the scenes in the music industry for several years, Zenteno no- ticed a lack of diversity not only in festival lineups but among those who organize them. “You have Austin City Limits, you have Jmblya, you have these big festivals that have existed for the last however many years,” Zenteno says. “And within the con- text of that, you very rarely see a lot of Latin representation. So I felt like ‘Hey, if you want to see change, be the change.’” Although last year’s Centro Popular showcased Latin-owned restaurants as well as performers, Zenteno still hasn’t de- cided if he’ll include restaurants in this year’s festival, mostly because he’s antici- pating an even larger crowd for the musical performers. Last year, Zenteno partnered with Fort Worth’s Fortress Festival to launch Centro Popular, but this time around, he plans to fund it out of his own pocket to maintain creative control. “[Fortress Festival is] still involved this year, from a venue perspective,” Zenteno says, “But in regards to funding, this is 1,000% my event. There’s nobody else in- volved with this event other than Lorenzo, on that side of it. How I maneuver is a lot different now, because this is a situation where I want to ensure that we’re repre- sented correctly, and we put on the best pos- sible event that we can.” dallasobserver.com | CONTENTS | UNFAIR PARK | SCHUTZE | FEATURE | NIGHT+DAY | CULTURE | MOVIES | DISH | MUSIC | CLASSIFIED | DALLAS OBSERVER MONTH XX–MONTH XX, 2014 AUGUST 4 - 10, 2022 DALLAS OBSERVER CLASSIFIED | MUSIC | DISH | CULTURE | UNFAIR PARK | CONTENTS dallasobserver.com
