He’s won CMA’s Musician of the Year award three years running, and now Coral Reefer Mac McAnally’s home state of Mississippi has bestowed even more honors on the singer/songwriter:
First during a ceremony in Jackson, and emceed by Marty Stuart, Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour and the Mississippi Arts Commission presented McAnally with the 2011 Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. A bronze cast statue designed by artist Bill Dunlap represents the distinction.
The next day, McAnally became only the sixth artist to be recognized with a marker on the Mississippi Country Music Trail. The marker was unveiled at the same city park in Belmont, MS where Mac once played as a child. He joins such music luminaries as Jimmie Rodgers and Marty Stuart.
“This is an amazing honor for me to be acknowledged in such a way by the state I grew up in and was inspired by,” McAnally said. “Music is a vital part of life in Mississippi—from the Delta blues to country to Southern rock. It seeps into your very soul. I am proud to have grown up in a state so rich in culture and with such an amazing and deep musical heritage.”
Music was a direct path for young Lyman “Mac” McAnally. Born in Red Bay Alabama and raised in Belmont, Mississippi, he was a guitar and piano prodigy performing in clubs at 13, writing songs at 15 and a Muscle Shoals studio mainstay by 18. He scored his own record deal by the age of 17 and was later touring as a member of Jimmy Buffett’s Coral Reefer Band, a position he holds to this day. As a songwriter, McAnally has scored numerous #1 hits, including Kenny Chesney’s 2009 #1 “Down The Road.”
Congrats Mac on another well-deserved honor!