We won’t soon forget the 57th Annual CMA Awards, which took place in Nashville last night (11/8), and we don’t think Lainey Wilson, Jelly Roll, or Wynonna will forget the evening either.

Lainey, of course, was the night’s top winner, winning a total of seven awards (she was nominated for nine). She won the Female Vocalist award for the second year in a row, the coveted Album of the Year Award for Bell Bottom Country, and the night’s top honor of Entertainer of the Year as a first-time nominee.

Jelly Roll both opened and closed the CMA Awwrds. He gave a stirring speech when he won the New Artist award and dazzled the press room backstage with his fun attitude and thankful and sweet manner to every journalist in the room. It’s pretty clear that everyone loves Jelly Roll.

Backstage, after he won the award, he excitedly told us where he plans to keep his CMA award when it arrives at his home in Nashville. He said, “I have a room that is the stuff that has come to mean the most to me. The family of Gary Rossington, the late great guitar player from Lynyrd Skynyrd, gifted me one of his guitars out of his vault. I have it right next to my Craig Morgan handwritten lyric sheet. Which is right next to Eric Church’s note he gave me the first time I opened up for him, and it’s signed. That’s really the memories I’ll cherish forever.”

And then there is Wynonna, who performed the opening song “Need A Favor” with Jelly and got the internet buzzing about what some called a shaky performance. She reacted and “read the comments,” releasing a video clip late last night saying how nervous she was to perform last night. Still, her performance with Jelly sounded fantastic, as Wynona usually does with her powerful and legendary vocals.

It’s hard to say who really stood out on the show at the 57th CMA Awards: it was a fantastic show. But if anyone owned the night, it was the CMA’s newest Entertainer of the Year, Lainey. As we think back to a night of fun and great country music, we share what we believe were the top moments everyone is talking about from the 2023 CMA awards.

RELATED: 2023 CMA Awards Winners List

Wynonna Judd's Performance With Jelly Roll
There was so much talk about the opening CMA Awards performance of “Need A Favor” by Jelly Roll and Wynonna Judd. Fans expressed concern online that Wy seemed shaky; Wy sang with a firm grip on Jelly’s jacket throughout the song, which the star-studded crowd loved. A church choir accompanied the powerful song, and as the song ended, fire rained down on the stage. Regardless of all the talk about Wynonna’s performance, the song sounded amazing and was a show highlight for sure.
Lainey Wilson's Performance
Lainey told us before the CMA Awards that when she performs on an award show, she likes to show a different side of herself and do different kinds of performances. She did just that with her gripping performance of “Wildflowers and Wild Horses,” a song from her album Bell Bottom Country. She sang in front of a Western backdrop, and her performance was one of the best of the night.
HARDY, Post Malone, and Morgan Wallen's Performance
It was so great to see country stars honor the late great Joe Diffie and his hits of the 1990s. HARDY and Morgan Wallen paid tribute to Joe in the best way possible, playing two of his biggest songs for a packed CMA crowd. The addition of Post Malone to the performance was epic, and it was nice to see him dress like a country boy and sound like he’s a natural fit with two of country music’s biggest voices (Wallen and HARDY) of today.
Tanya Tucker with LBT Performance
Tanya Tucker is a name that should have been added to the Country Music Hall of Fame years ago, and in 2023, she was finally inducted as a member. Her songs have spanned decades, and she has contributed so much to country music, winning her first Grammy award just a few years ago (2020) with Brandi Carlile. It is important to honor those in country music who paved the way for today’s stars, and it was nice to see a CMHOF performance from Tanya and Little Big Town singing Tucker’s mega-hit from the 1970s, “Delta Dawn.”
Lainey Wilson Winning Entertainer of the Year
The biggest winner of the night was Lainey Wilson, who said in her tearful speech when she won the top award of Entertainer of the Year, “This is all I’ve ever wanted to do. It’s the only thing I know how to do. We have played… I think at the end of the year, we’ll have played about 186 shows this year, and we’ve worked our butts off this year and so many years in between. I’ve been in this town for 12-and-a-half years, and it finally feels like country music is starting to love me back.”