News Release

Three-time GRAMMY® Award-winning, Mississippi-born country artist Charley Pride will be the inaugural recipient of GRAMMY Museum® Mississippi’s Crossroads of American Music Award at the Mississippi Museum’s 2019 Gala today (Nov. 1) at 6 p.m.

Established by the Museum’s Board of Directors, the Crossroads of American Music Award honors an artist who has made significant musical contributions influenced by the creativity born in the cradle of American music. Pride will appear at the Museum’s 2019 Gala to accept the award on Nov. 1 at the Museum in Cleveland, Miss.

The theme for the 2019 GRAMMY Museum Mississippi Gala is “Girls, Guitars, & Rocktail Bars.” The event will feature a reception, dinner and cocktails, live music from Nashville country pop trio Southern Halo and Memphis’ Almost Famous and a special performance from Charley Pride, and a live auction.

The annual GRAMMY Museum Mississippi Gala is the Museum’s signature fundraising event, with proceeds benefiting the Museum’s education program, which seeks to use music as a gateway to learning by inspiring and cultivating creativity, critical thinking and self-expression.

Charley Pride is celebrating more than 50 years as a recording artist. He has enjoyed one of the most successful careers in the history of country music and is credited with helping to break color barriers by becoming the first black superstar within the genre.

A true living legend, he has sold tens of millions of records worldwide with his large repertoire of hits. A three-time GRAMMY® award and Recording Academy “Lifetime Achievement Award” winner, Pride has garnered no less than 36 chart-topping country hits, including “Kiss An Angel Good Morning,” a massive #1 crossover hit that sold over a million singles and helped Pride land the Country Music Association’s “Entertainer of the Year” award in 1971 and the “Top Male Vocalist” awards of 1971 and 1972.

A proud member of the Grand Ole Opry, Pride continues to perform concerts worldwide and has toured the United States, Canada, Ireland, The United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand over the last several years. His latest album, Music In My Heart, was released in 2017 on Music City Records.

Developed by the Cleveland Music Foundation—a nonprofit organization founded in 2011—the 28,000-square-foot GRAMMY Museum Mississippi is housed near the campus of Delta State University, home of the Delta Music Institute’s Entertainment Industry Studies program, which features the most unique audio recording facilities in the South.

CUTLINE:  Charley Pride