Exclusive: Date Set For ACM Honors

The 11th annual ACM Honors will be held Wednesday, Aug. 23, at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium. The event recognizes special honorees and off-camera winners of the annual ACM Awards.

Unlike previous years, the honorees in ACM Honors categories such as Industry Awards and Studio Awards will be announced after the 52nd annual ACM Awards are aired from Las Vegas, though no specific date for the ACM Honors announcement has been set.

“We decided to create greater separation between our [ACM] awards in Las Vegas and the ACM Honors, really as a way to lift up ACM Honors to an even higher profile,” ACM CEO Pete Fisher said. “So instead of announcing prior to the ACMs, we thought these winners deserved to have their own moment, versus kind of getting lost in all of the activity surrounding Las Vegas.”

Last year, the ACM Honors reached more than 4 million viewers when it aired for the first time on CBS. “At this point, we are still in discussions with CBS, but all signs point to yes, that it will be televised for a second year,” Fisher said.

“We felt that ACM Honors has really found a personality of its own,” said Fisher. “It’s distinctive and filled with a lot of heart. Even as we’ve moved to a televised show last year, I think the team did a great job of preserving the heart. So this is a great way for us to kind of elevate and express our even greater devotion to making ACM Honors one of our two flagship events in Music City annually, the other one being the ACM Lifting Lives Summer Camp.”