NMPA Celebrates Nashville Songwriters With Gold & Platinum Gala

NMPA 10.19.17 @Moments By Moser Photography

Thursday (Oct. 19), Nashville’s top songwriters and publishers from the last year gathered to receive their Gold, Platinum and Multi-Platinum honors from NMPA. The NMPA Gold & Platinum program launched in October 2007 and identifies and honors the songwriters of RIAA-certified hit songs.

NMPA President & CEO David Israelite kicked off the event with help from RIAA President Mitch Glazier who detailed the partnership between the two organizations. In attendance were approximately 50 songwriters including multi-Platinum honorees like Shane McAnally, Zach Crowell, Dallas Davidson, Sean Douglas, Jerry Flowers, Rob Hatch, Jim Collins, David Lee Murphy, Joseph Spargur, and many more.

In addition to awarding the 17 Gold, 18 Platinum and 9 Multi-Platinum songwriters, NMPA announced three top annual honors: Top Song, Top Songwriter and Top Publisher. The Top Song award was a tie between “Body Like a Back Road” written by Zach Crowell, Sam Hunt, Shane McAnally and Josh Osborne, and “H.O.L.Y” written by busbee, Nate Cyphert and William Larsen, both certified 3x multi-Platinum and with 3 million certified units.

NMPA 10.19.17 @Moments By Moser Photography

The top two songwriters of the year were Shane McAnally with 4 multi-platinum, 3 platinum, and 2 Gold certifications and Ashley Gorley with 1 multi-platinum, 4 Platinum, and 9 Gold certifications.

The Top Publisher was awarded to Sony/ATV Music Publishing and Nashville’s President and CEO Troy Tomlinson attended to accept the award.

“On behalf of all of us at Sony/ATV and in particular our songwriters who made this all possible, we are honored to be the NMPA’s first ever Publisher of the Year. What a great event and we’ll be back here next year, hopefully with the same result,” said the Chairman and CEO of Sony/ATV Music Publishing Martin Bandier.

“Since our program’s inception 10 years ago, NMPA has awarded 8,817 total certifications, and that number rises with each hit song. We are thrilled to recognize the top songwriters of the past year – and look forward to honoring the best in the business each year at our annual gala,” said Israelite. “When a song goes Gold – or beyond – the songwriter should receive recognition just like the performer of that song – and some shiny hardware too.”

NMPA 10.19.17 @Moments By Moser Photography

NMPA 10.19.17 @Moments By Moser Photography

NMPA 10.19.17 @Moments By Moser Photography

NMPA 10.19.17 @Moments By Moser Photography

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Jessica Nicholson

Jessica Nicholson serves as the Managing Editor for MusicRow magazine. Her previous music journalism experience includes work with Country Weekly magazine and Contemporary Christian Music (CCM) magazine. She holds a BBA degree in Music Business and Marketing from Belmont University. She welcomes your feedback at jnicholson@musicrow.com.

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