ACM Award Winners Coming North This Summer

Good news for those of us who weren't at AT&T Stadium for Sunday's ACM Awards: Many of those award winners are coming north.

ACM Entertainer of the Year Luke Bryan will be at TCF Bank Stadium on June 20 with Florida Georgia Line. FGL also picked up an award or two in Dallas on Sunday. I had the pleasure to see Bryan at Country Jam in Eau Claire, Wis., last summer. He rocked the night away.

Bryan's co-host Blake Shelton will appear at WE Fest in Detroit Lakes, Minn., in early August. Shelton did not win any awards on Sunday, but his wife, Miranda Lambert, can probably share one of hers. Lambert will also play at WE Fest. ACM performers Dierks Bentley and Rascall Flatts join them in Detroit Lakes. KDHL AM 920 and Kat Kountry 105FM will be giving away discount tickets to WE Fest. Listen and watch for details. See Lambert's performance from Sunday.

Shelton will be in Eau Claire for Country Jam in late July. Eric Church also headlines a night there.

Kenny Chesney, who was one of several Milestone Award winners, will take over Target Field on July 18 and 19. Male Vocalist of the Year Jason Aldean and New Artist of the Year winner Cole Swindell will open for him. I'm going to the Sunday show and will be counting down the days.

Garth Brooks, another Milestone recipient at the ACM Awards, just set records in Minneapolis last fall. Watch his salute to the troops from Sunday.

Among the touching moments at Sunday's awards show was Taylor Swift's mom, Andrea, presenting her with a Milestone Award. The crowd also saluted Randy Travis who has battled health problems.

There were some humorous tidbits, mostly the confusion of the award winners as to which way to stand and which camera to look at. I got a chuckle when the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders had to drag the members of Alabama out of the way so the award winner could have the stage.

Sunday's show was heavy on emotional songs, with Martina McBride's "Independence Day," Brooks' "All-American Boy" and Alan Jackson's "Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)."