Beyoncé’s first country album, “Cowboy Carter,” has been streamed more than 1 billion times on Spotify. Upon its release in March, it debuted at the top of both the Billboard 200 and Top Country charts. Twenty-three of its 27 tracks charted on the Billboard Hot 100. “Texas Hold ’Em,” the album’s first single, has amassed more than 500 million streams.
But when the nominees for this year’s Country Music Association awards were recently announced, the woman with this year’s best-selling country album received zero nominations.
It’s not a snub of Beyoncé. It’s a missed opportunity for country music.
Since February, when Beyoncé teased her first country music album in an Instagram post, there’s been a sour stench of blowback from country purists. It only increased when “Texas Hold ’Em” became inescapable with the BeyHive — the most devoted and protective fan base this side of Swifties — performing choreographed dances to the song on social media while dressed in boots, ornate belt buckles, pearl-buttoned shirts, and cowboy hats.
But there were also many TikTok and Instagram videos in which a person pretends to be unconscious (or worse) after a car accident. When “Texas Hold ’Em” comes on the radio, they stir just long enough to reach over and turn it off — as if they don’t want Beyoncé’s voice or that song to be the last sound they hear before shuffling off this mortal coil.
That was the least of it. Country music stations that initially refused to play Beyoncé’s country album — one Oklahoma general manager responded to an irate fan, “We do not play Beyoncé . . . as we are a country music station” — acquiesced only after being inundated with calls from angry Beyoncé fans.
Perhaps country radio programmers felt spurned when prior to the release of “Cowboy Carter,” Beyoncé declared: “This ain’t a Country album. This is a ‘Beyoncé’ album.”
Can Beyoncé being denied any nominations be chalked up to racism? In part, probably. When the singer performed her country song “Daddy Lessons” with The Chicks (formerly The Dixie Chicks) at the CMAs in 2016, she was met with a torrent of misogynoir, the racist and misogynistic hatred that targets Black women, on multiple social media platforms.
If that was the reaction after a single CMA appearance, there was never a chance that Beyoncé would be nominated for country music’s biggest awards.
Plus country music is generally considered to have one of the most conservative fan bases. With Election Day weeks away, CMA officials probably didn’t want to highlight the woman who gave Vice President Kamala Harris permission to use her song “Freedom” as her campaign’s anthem but blocked Donald Trump when he put the song in a campaign video without permission.
But in ignoring Beyoncé, whose album featured collaborations with country icons Willie Nelson and Dolly Parton, the CMAs blew a chance to expand country music’s audience.
In recent years, New York’s Metropolitan Opera has reached more diverse audiences with works by Black composers like Terence Blanchard (“Fire Shut Up in My Bones” and “Champion”) and its first presentation of a Spanish-language opera in more than a century with Daniel Catán’s “Florencia en el Amazonas” last year. It certainly also helped that the Met, the nation’s premier opera house, finally in 2015 stopped using blackface-style makeup on white performers in works like Verdi’s “Otello.”
Beyoncé doesn’t need the CMAs. But the awards show, which airs in November, certainly could have used her. It would have found an audience among people who never watch the ceremonies, and in waiting to see Beyoncé, they might have discovered other artists and music to enjoy. At a time when the music industry is struggling and musicians are feeling the crunch of selling far fewer albums than they once did, artists can use all the exposure and help they can get.
But even in her absence, Beyoncé’s influence will be felt. Shaboozey, a Black rising star who performed on “Cowboy Carter” songs, received two CMA nominations. In a post on X, he thanked Beyoncé “for opening a door for us, starting a conversation, and giving us one of the most innovative country albums of all time!”
If Shaboozey wins, you can bet when he takes the stage, he will lift up Beyoncé’s name. To date, Beyoncé has said nothing about being overlooked by the CMAs, and it’s not likely that she will. Her fans are already saying all that needs to be said.
Oh, and just in case anyone is wondering who got the most CMA nominations this year — seven — it’s Morgan Wallen, who was briefly sidelined in 2021 but quickly embraced again by the country community after he was caught on video using the n-word.
Renée Graham is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at renee.graham@globe.com. Follow her @reneeygraham.
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