Carly Pearce and Lee Brice Win CMA Musical Event of the Year

Carly Pearce and Lee Brice have been named Musical Event of the Year ahead of the CMA Awards on Wednesday night for their collaboration “I Hope You’re Happy Now,” winning one of the three awards the song is nominated for. Pearce celebrated the news by sharing a video of herself bursting into tears mid-interview after hearing that she won, shaking her head in disbelief and covering her mouth with her hands.

“GUYS I WAS SITTING DOING INTERVIEWS AND GOT THE NEWS THAT [Lee Brice] AND I WON ‘MUSICAL EVENT OF THE YEAR,’” she captioned the clip. “This was the moment I found out as I sobbed on the phone in my PJs. Thank you, thank you, thank you. In a year that started as the hardest I’ve ever experienced, YALL are helping me see the big, bright, BEAUTIFUL light at the end of the tunnel.”

Brice shared the news on his own page and wrote, “Well this is pretty cool news to wake up to!! Thank you [CMA]!!” The duo was scheduled to perform the song at the CMA Awards on Wednesday night, but Brice tested positive for COVID-19 and is unable to attend. Pearce will instead be joined by Lady A‘s Charles Kelley for the performance.

Pearce wrote “I Hope You’re Happy Now” with Luke Combs, Randy Montana and Jonathan Singleton and told her record label that being nominated for Song of the Year for the track “means extra.”

“That’s on another level,” she said. “You realize how important songs are when you do this and you realize how many great songs happen. And to think that I was recognized as a songwriter, solely, on something that was so special and so personal to me, that is very, very special to me because it shows something outside of just Carly Pearce.”

“I Hope You’re Happy Now” was produced by the late producer busbee, who was a champion for Pearce early in her career. “It’s the little gift that keeps giving,” she reflected of the song. “This song started from me asking Luke Combs at a radio show, ‘Hey, will you write a song with me?’ To then see Lee come and absolutely sing it into the rafters, to then all of this. Also, on a personal note, it is the last song that busbee, my producer, worked on before he got sick and passed away from brain cancer. And I could not think of a more special moment for the person that gave me so much.”