At CMA Awards, Dolly Parton, Garth Brooks and more discuss wins backstage

(3 Nov 2016) AT CMA AWARDS, DOLLY PARTON, GARTH BROOKS AND MORE DISCUSS WINS BACKSTAGE Dolly Parton will never forget receiving a love letter from a blast of music's leading ladies; Thomas Rhett was awarded for a love letter to his wife that is helping share the love; and Garth Brooks plans on having his CMA award transformed into a music-business version of a Super Bowl ring. Or maybe he was just joking. After the 50th-annual Country Music Association Awards in Nashville, Tenn. concluded Wednesday (2 NOV. 2016), Brooks, who was named entertainer of the year, recalled how he ran into former American footballer Peyton Manning backstage. "I asked (Manning), 'Where is the 50th?'" referring to Manning's Super Bowl 50 ring, acquired earlier this year, which he was not wearing. Brooks said he then told Manning, "I'm going to make a ring out of this one (referring to his CMA statuette). I'm going to put it on my finger. And I'm going wear it the rest of my life. The 50th: That's a cool thing.'" Parton, who was honored with the CMA's lifetime achievement award, recounted her memories of the evening in bits and bites. "When we were doing 'I Will Always Love You,' my whole life just took a little twirl," she said. "And back when I was working with Porter Wagoner, when I first wrote that song, and all the stuff that it meant and the fact that I was sitting by Vince Gill, and we recorded it as a duet, and it was just, all of a sudden, like my whole life: a lifetime achievement award, I guess. That's why they give it to you. But I was thinking so many things and looking at all those beautiful women up there, singing my song and seeming like they appreciated me. It was very touching really." Thomas Rhett, whose "Die a Happy Man" was named single of the year, spoke about how the song has become a romantic staple across the U.S.. "This song," he said, "it's just transcended a lot to the fans and a lot of people use it as their wedding song, and boyfriends try to woo girls to date them with this song. And, I don't know, I just think it also to try sort of lined up. SO super pumped for that, yeah." Album of the year went to Eric Church for "Mr. Misunderstood," which had an unconventional release: first to fan-club members, then exclusively to iTunes. The album was released one year ago to the day after its big win: 3 Nov. 2015. "Well, I think what's great about (being named album of the year) is it kind of validates what I've always believed," Church said. "If you put everything into making the best record you can make regardless of how you release it, and regardless of the press and the hype, that the music wins. And I think, for me, that was the biggest thing about the night. Music wins. And it doesn't matter. You don't need a 12-week ad cycle on a bunch of networks to do an album. And I think the way we did this is we let the music lead and we started with the fans. I didn't think we'd be a year later winning album of the year. But we made the best album we could and we just let the music be the music. And I just think for our entire career that's what we always tried to do." Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...