Image Courtesy CMAMonday night in New York City, Garth Brooks was honored with the ASCAP Centennial Award — a new honor created to mark the performing rights organization’s 100th anniversary. Garth was recognized alongside the night’s other honorees, including one of his heroes — Billy Joel. Joan Baez, Stevie Wonder and musical theater legend Stephen Sondheim also received the Centennial Award Monday night.
Garth says, “I feel lucky, ’cause an award really, truthfully, is only good as the names that have won in the past or other things, so this was pretty sweet that they did this.”
The Centennial Award honors Garth as a songwriter, and his wife, Trisha Yearwood, performed one of his compositions, “If Tomorrow Never Comes,” in his honor. Garth co-wrote that song with Kent Blazy, who first introduced Garth to Trisha at the beginning of their respective careers.
Says Garth, “Tonight, it’s a full circle. So, not only the song, but all involved kind of creates life for us. So, this is a big night for us.”
Trisha is quick to call Garth a “poet” and a “great songwriter.”
She says, “I’ll hear him humming something or singing something, and I’ll go, ‘What song is that?’ And he’s like, ‘Oh, I don’t know.’ It’ll be a piece of something that sounds amazing to me that he’s just pulled out of thin air from somewhere that he’s just humming. And that’s how those songs get started.”
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