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Dove Awards 2008 Update:

This post was written pre-Dove Awards and approximate 600+ people have read it.  If you want to see the Dove Award Winners for 2008 click here.  Enjoy and thanks for visiting.   Congrats and God bless to all the Dove winners and nominees.

Best of the Dove Awards 2008:

If you’re half the Christian music fan I am, you’re probably pretty enthusiastic about the upcoming Dove Awards as they hit the stage of the Grand Ole Opry. Christian Today highlights key nominees:

Tied for the second most nominations were rap/rocker tobyMac, alternative worship group David Crowder Band, and praise-and-worship leader Chris Tomlin (a GMA favorite for the past three years). All three snagged five nominations, including Artist and Song of the Year honors.

Hot off a Grammy sweep and an impressive run at the Stellars, legendary gospel quartet The Clark Sisters received four nominations, including Group and Artist of the Year honors. Also with four nods were Point of Grace, Ernie Haase & Signature Sound, and Ricky Skaggs.

Styll added that the organization’s board of directors decided to expand the main artist categories — Artist, New Artist, Group, Male Vocalist and Female Vocalist of the Year — from five to seven nominee slots, citing a difficulty “in the past for the artist categories to fairly represent and celebrate the breadth and depth of our music’s diversity.”

Said expansion apparently made room to recognize Dove award newcomers like Hillsong United, Marvin Sapp, Mandisa, Gerald Wolfe, and Skillet in the major categories alongside mainstays like Tomlin, Casting Crowns, Amy Grant, Mark Schultz, and Natalie Grant. More diverse still was the New Artist award, with nominees as varied as Rush of Fools, Austins Bridge, 33 Miles, DeWayne Woods, Brandon Heath, Mandisa, and Group 1 Crew.

The Christian Post reports:

The annual awards show, a Christian version of the Grammys, celebrates the very best of Gospel and Christian music by recognizing talented singers, bands and songwriters with a Dove Award – considered Christian music’s highest honor. Awards are also given to the top albums, music videos, and musicals in a plethora of genres.

In addition to Artist of the Year, Mark Hall of Casting Crowns received five other nods in this year’s Dove Awards. For Male Vocalist of the Year, Hall will be contending with Switchfoot’s frontman Jon Foreman, Mark Schultz, tobyMac and last year’s winner Chris Tomlin, among others. His band is up for Group of the Year and their hit single “East to West” has a chance for song of the year. Casting Crowns was named Group of the Year last year.

Other notable nominations include Chris Tomlin, the David Crowder Band and tobyMac who have five nominations each.

The GMA Board of Directors this year increased the number of nominees from five to seven in categories honoring the Top Artist, New Artist, Group, Male Vocalist and Female Vocalist.

“Gospel and Christian music artists share an expressed intent to honor God through music and the freedom to create their art without stylistic boundaries. This year’s Dove nominations are a testament to that,” said GMA President and CEO John W. Styll.

Here list of the Christian artists who are Dove Award nominees for 2008 or you can go here for a full list of presenters and performers at the Dove Awards Ceremony for 2008. For more information go to Dove Awards or the Gospel Music Association Website.

Any artists overlooked? Any favorites? Any predictions? Any surprises? Who are you looking forward to seeing at the Dove Awards in 2008?

(image credit: ahhhh)