Billboard Music Awards 2020 Time & Channel

Tonight is the night of the Billboard Music Awards 2020. If you’re ready to tune in, the show airs at 8 p.m. Eastern time and Pacific time on NBC Wednesday, October 14, 2020.

The show is airing live from the Dolby Theater in Los Angeles, California. Kelly Clarkson is the show’s host for the second year in a row, and also the opening performer. This is her third time serving as the host.

Here’s what you need to know:

Garth Brooks Will Receive The Billboard Music Awards 2020 Icon Award

Brooks will receive a high honor at tonight’s Billboard Music Awards ceremony. He was named for the 2020 icon award, according to Billboard. Cher, a past recipient of the icon award, will be the award’s presenter. Other past recipients include Mariah Carey, Janet Jackson, Stevie Wonder and Neil Diamond.

A Garth Brooks press release announcing the award said:

A true legend, Brooks is the first and only artist in history to achieve eight diamond-certified albums at over 10 million album sales each. He remains the #1-selling solo artist in U.S. history, certified by the RIAA with more than 156 million album sales.

Brooks has earned nine No. 1 albums on the all-genre Billboard 200 chart (the most of any country artist), with chart-toppers in the ’90s, ’00s and ’10s. Seven of them debuted at No. 1. Brooks also claimed 17 No. 1s on the Top Country Albums chart and 89 hits on the Hot Country Songs chart including 19 No. 1s. Among those leaders: ‘Friends in Low Places,’ ‘The Thunder Rolls,’ ‘Ain’t Going Down (Til the Sun Comes Up),’ ‘Longneck Bottle’ and ‘More Than a Memory.’

Brooks, a 19-time winner at the Billboard Music Awards, is the first person ever to appear on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart in the ‘80s, ‘90s, ‘00s, ‘10s and ‘20s – five consecutive decades. It was his first single off his first album that made the chart in the ’80s, his press release said. “Much Too Young (to Feel This Da*n Old)” first made the chart as the No. 94 hit, then rose to No. 8.

The 2020 Billboard Music Awards Was Postponed Due to the Coronavirus

The 2020 Billboard Music Awards was among thousands of annual events to be cancelled or postponed due to COVID-19. The show was originally scheduled for April 29 in Las Vegas.

A joint statement from NBC and dick clark productions March 17, 2020, quoted by Billboard, said:

In accordance with the current guidelines set forth by national and local health officials and in order to ensure the health and safety of our artists, fans, guests and staff – we are postponing the Billboard Music Awards. For more than two decades, the Billboard Music Awards has honored the best in music based on the Billboard charts, and we look forward to celebrating the incredible artists who topped those charts over the last year.

dcp and NBC will announce a new date and venue for the show in the near future.

Billboard released a column in April saying production companies should come up with a new approach for reformat awards shows during the pandemic.

“This can be an opportunity for awards show organizers to re-create the format amid the coronavirus crisis,” the column said.