American Music Award: Encyclopedia - American Music Award

American Music Award

The American Music Awards show is one of four annual major US music awards shows (the others being the Billboard Music Awards, the Grammy Awards, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony). The AMAs were created by Dick Clark in 1973 to compete with the Grammys.Michael Jackson and Donny Osmond co-hosted the first award show with Rodney Allen - Rippy. While the Grammys are awarded based on votes by members of the entertainment industry, the AMAs are determined by a poll of music buyers. The "big three" established awards shows (AMAs, Billboard Music Awards, and Grammys) compete for prestige and television ratings, with the Grammys nominally rewarding quality and both the AMAs and Billboard Music Awards rewarding popularity. Stories of artists being pressured to participate in one awards show over the other have been fodder for tabloid gossip and controversy.

The only other major difference between the Grammys and Billboard Music Awards is that the AMAs do not currently have an award for Best Single/Record but the Grammys and Billboard Music Awards do.

However, since the establishment of the Billboard Music Awards in 1989, there have been instances where artists (such as The Dixie Chicks and Céline Dion) have won all of the "big three" major music awards (including the AMAs). But the need for a unified music awards system (on the mold of horse racing's Triple Crown) only complicates the competition between the AMAs and the other awards shows.

For the first decade or so, the AMAs had multiple hosts, each representing a genre of music. For instance, Glen Campbell would host the country portion (Campbell, in fact, has co-hosted the AMAs more times than any other host or co-host), while other artists would co-host to represent his/her genre. In recent years, however, there has been one single host.

From its inception in 1973 until 2003, the AMAs have been held in mid- to late-January, but were moved to November beginning in 2003 so as not to further compete with other major awards shows (such as the Golden Globe Awards and the Academy Awards).

The most American Music Awards belong to Alabama who have collected twenty-two awards. The record for a female artist belongs to Whitney Houston, who was collected twenty-one.

The record for the most American Music Awards won in a single year is held by both Michael Jackson (for 1983's Thriller), and Whitney Houston (for 1993's The Bodyguard Soundtrack), each with 8 awards to their credit (including the Award of Merit, which both artists were awarded during their respective year).

American Music Award - American Music Awards by Year

• 2005 American Music Awards
• 2004 American Music Awards

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "American Music Award", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki