Trisha Yearwood calls CMT's humanitarian award a 'call to me to step up my game'

Country music icon Trisha Yearwood is set to receive the inaugural June Carter Cash Humanitarian Award and premiere a brand-new song at the CMT Music Awards on Sunday.

“I knew June and Johnny a little bit,” she said at her concessions stand “Trisha’s Tailgate” inside the Moody Center, the host arena for the CMTs. “She was a ball of energy. When her and Johnny walked into a room, she was the Tasmanian devil spinning around. She was so full of love, light and energy. So when I heard about this award and I realized she was who it was named after, it made me so happy to be in the same sentence with her because she was a force.”

The Humanitarian Award recognizes an artist, duo/group or industry veteran who selflessly serves. Yearwood said she is overwhelmed with gratitude to accept the prestige.

“It almost feels awkward to accept an award like this because it feels like, I don’t know if you ever would feel like you deserve it,” she said, “but it is a call to me to step up my game."

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The “XXX’s and OOO’s” singer’s philanthropy includes working with Habitat for Humanity for the past two decades, the Carter Work Project and National Women Build Week. She was named a Habitat Humanitarian in 2016 with husband Garth Brooks.

“It’s wonderful to write a check for charity, which we do, everybody does that and it’s wonderful,” she says. “But to actually go work alongside somebody that’s going to live in a house and get dirty. I almost feel guilty sometimes when we leave, because I know they’re thanking us, but we got a lot more out of it than they probably did.”

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The singer is returning to the CMT stage for the first time in five years and debuting, “Put it in a Song.”

“I started writing a year and a half ago,” she says. “I’m more shocked than anybody that I’m standing here talking about this, because I was gearing up to talk about putting an album out next year.”

The CMT Awards will air on Sunday, from 8 p.m. - 11 p.m. EST on CBS and Paramount+. Kelsea Ballerini will host with an array of performances including Jelly Roll, Megan Moroney, Keith Urban and Sam Hunt.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Trisha Yearwood to receive June Carter Cash award at 2024 CMT Awards