ACM Awards to bin off New Vocal Duo and New Vocal Group categories for 2020 awards

The ACM Awards will be two categories lighter for 2020 as they are dropping both the New Vocal Duo and New Vocal Group awards.
It’ll be the first time in five years that the categories won’t be included in the showpiece event, which is partially due to the fact that artists are struggling to meet the eligibility requirements.
The requirements are that you cannot be nominated twice in a three year period, can’t be former winners or be former winners of either Entertainer of the Year or Duo or Group of the Year and can’t have released a third album.
As such, the pool is somewhat quite limited for artists out there – to the point that last year, the ACM Awards had a combined New Vocal Duo or Group of the Year category, with LANCO, Runaway June and High Valley being nominated. Of these, LANCO took home the award.
However, both Runaway June and High Valley are ineligible for 2020 as they have been nominated twice in a three year period and there are other complications with nominations too – for example, if The Highwomen (Maren Morris, Brandi Carlile, Amanda Shires and Natalie Hemby) charted a top 40 single, they would be in contention, but if Morris or Carlile won Female Vocalist of the Year, the whole group would then be ineligible as they would contain a member that wasn’t ‘new’.
The 2020 ACM Awards will take place on April 5 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, America.