Kennedy Center Honors 2018

So back in December I watched the Kennedy Center Honors for the first time, and they gave their award to a couple of favorites: Philip Glass and Wayne Shorter. Two awards were also given to Cher and Reba McEntire, artists whom I own no songs of. A special award was given to the "Hamilton" team.

That, of course, got me thinking about which musicians had been awarded the honor whom I didn’t own. Leaving out a few conductors who, while technically having written some music, are not essentially musicians, as well as actors or actresses who are better known for their non-musical performances, I went through and divided them into composers and performers. From there I have put the musicians I don’t own (or, frankly, know the works of) in the following categories:

Bold – heard their music but didn’t like enough to own

Italic – had never heard their music before (and often, hadn’t heard of them…)

Classical Composers

Virgil Thomson

Gian Carlo Menotti

Morton Gould

William Schuman

Classical Performers

Rudolf Serkin

Van Cliburn

Nathan Milstein

Andre Previn* Also a significant composer

Leon Fleisher

Alexander Schneider

Opera Singers

Beverly Sills

Placido Domingo

Grace Bumbry

Jessye Norman

Marilyn Horne

Martina Arroyo

Rise Stevens

Popular Musicians

Perry Como

Sammy Davis Jr.

Loretta Lynn

Harry Belafonte

Gloria Estefan

LL Cool J

Lionel Richie

Reba McEntire

Cher

Marion Williams

So there you have it. And of course, for completion's sake, here are the musical winners whose work I do own. Note that a new category has to be added of 'Popular Composers':

Classical Composers

Aaron Copland
Leonard Bernstein
John Williams
Philip Glass

Classical Performers

Arthur Rubinstein
Isaac Stern
Yehudi Menuhin
Mstislav Rostropovich
Itzhak Perlman
Yo-Yo Ma
Martha Argerich

Opera Singers

Leontyne Price
Luciano Pavarotti
Joan Sutherland

Popular Musicians

Marian Anderson
Ella Fitzgerald
Count Basie* Also a significant composer
Benny Goodman
Frank Sinatra
Lena Horne
Ray Charles *Also a significant composer
Dizzy Gillespie *Also a significant composer
Roy Acuff
Lionel Hampton
Aretha Franklin
Pete Seeger
BB King
Benny Carter
Johnny Cash
Bob Dylan *Also a significant composer
Willie Nelson
Stevie Wonder *Also a significant composer
Chuck Berry
Julie Andrews
Quincy Jones
Paul Simon *Also a significant composer
James Brown
Elton John *Also a significant composer
Tony Bennett
Tina Turner
Dolly Parton
Smokey Robinson
Brian Wilson *Also a significant composer
Diana Ross
George Jones
Barbara Streisand
The Who
Bruce Springsteen
Dave Brubeck *Also a significant composer
Merle Haggard
Paul McCartney *Also a significant composer
Neil Diamond
Sonny Rollins *Also a significant composer
Led Zeppelin
Buddy Guy
Herbie Hancock *Also a significant composer
Billy Joel
Carlos Santana
Al Green *Also a significant composer
Sting
Carole King *Also a significant composer
The Eagles
Mavis Staples
James Taylor *Also a significant composer
Wayne Shorter *Also a significant composer

Popular Composers

Richard Rodgers
Alan Jay Lerner & Frederick Loewe
Jule Styne
Betty Comden & Adolph Green
Stephen Sondheim
Fred Ebb & John Kander
Andrew Lloyd Webber
Jerry Herman
*Lin-Manuel Miranda* - Recipient of a special award for "Hamilton: An American Musical"