CRB Unveils New Garth Brooks ‘No Fences’ Award

Country Radio Broadcasters has established a new industry honor, the Garth Brooks “No Fences” Award. Presented by CRB and inspired by the influential career of Garth Brooks and his 1990 No Fences album, the award will recognize an individual in the country music industry who has demonstrated innovation, creativity, and tenacity.

Recipients of the Garth Brooks “No Fences” Award will have defied traditional standards and practices, positively changed the face of the industry, and established higher standards for measuring success. Additionally, their achievements will have expanded the country music industry’s profile on a national level, not only for their benefit but for the industry as a whole, for a sustained duration and with proven significant impact.

The inaugural recipient of this award will be honored at a future CRS, based on evaluations from a blue-ribbon committee comprised of CRB board members and representatives of Brooks’ team. Additionally, Brooks will appear at CRS 2023 on March 13 to discuss the collaboration with CRS and the last several years.

The award’s namesake comes from Brooks’ historic album release that further catapulted his remarkable career. With over 18 million copies sold worldwide, No Fences shattered sales and airplay records, and spearheaded country music’s expansion and its era-defining catalog.

CRB/CRS Executive Director RJ Curtis comments, “We all know about Garth’s monumentally successful career, which established this genre as popular, sustainable, and mainstream. What many don’t know, however, is that concurrent with his many personal accomplishments, Garth Brooks has given unwavering support for CRS during the past 30 years by showing up to CRS annually and creating innovative ways to engage, entertain, and educate CRS attendees that perfectly match the ‘growth through sharing’ mission of CRS. It’s fitting that we honor Garth’s innovative, tenacious spirit with this newly established award bearing his name.”

CRS 2023 will take place Monday, March 13 – Wednesday, March 15 at the Omni Nashville Hotel, and registration is open now.