Lainey Wilson, host of the 59th annual CMA Awards, opened up the Nov. 19 awards ceremony by paying tribute to her fellow country stars.
“Ever since I was a little girl, country music has been a huge part of my world,” she said. Growing up in small-town Louisiana, Wilson said her family never missed watching bull riding or the CMA Awards. And if they had to miss one, it wasn’t the CMA Awards.
Wilson said that the songs they’re celebrating tonight are the ones on her playlist when she’s sitting around the fire and or head-banging in the car.
“I could keep talking a little bit about these songs, or how ’bout I get my buddy Charlie Worsham up here and sing ’em for y’all?”
Worsham jumped on stage with a guitar in tow, and Wilson launched into a medley of some of country’s biggest hits, traveling through the crowd to greet the artists who perform them.
Starting out with Chris Stapleton’s “White Horse,” Wilson cycled her way through hits from across decades.
Wilson crooned “You Look Like You Love Me,” singing by Ella Langley in the crowd. She belted out “Redneck Woman,” singing the iconic lyric “I know all the words to every Charlie Daniels song” right next to Gretchen Wilson, who sat next to Hazel Daniels, Charlie’s widow, in the crowd.
As dancers jammed out in the aisle, Wilson greeted Lady A as she sang “Need You Now” and Miranda Lambert with “Gunpowder & Lead.”
She and Shaboozey duetted on his hit “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” before Little Big Town joined the fun for “Girl Crush.”
The number ended with some help from Keith Urban on guitar on vocals for his 1999 hit “Where The Blacktop Ends.”
The fiery number brought the crowd to their feet, singing along with timeless country hits of the past and present and setting a fiery and high-octane tone for night.
Wilson took the stage clad in a bold two-piece white and gold number, and a white cowboy hat to match.
Wilson is only the third woman to solo host the Country Music Awards, following in the footsteps of Dolly Parton in 1988 and Reba McEntire in 1991.
“I got some big ol’ shoes to fill, so I don’t take it lightly,” the 33-year-old country singer said at a Nov. 16 press conference in Nashville.