Lyric video series
CMA Awards · Lyric videos
One lyric video for the CMA Awards turned into a series.
CMA (Country Music Association), via STN Digital
For the 2021 CMA Awards, the Country Music Association wanted short lyric videos for its Song of the Year nominees, made for social. CrispFX was brought in through STN Digital to make the first one.
The brief
Each nominee needed a lyric video that felt like the song, not a template with the words swapped. Each also had to sit inside the CMA Awards look and work on every social format.
The approach
Forever After All came first: a sunset beach, palm trees and lyrics set against the sky. The CMA team loved it and asked for the rest.
Each song got its own world, built from stock footage and photography and treated to match the CMA Awards style. The Good Ones lives on a farm, with a pickup truck and a framed picture that becomes the title card. Starting Over sits in a recording studio full of lucky charms: dice, a penny, a four-leaf clover.
The type is timed to the vocal, so the videos read cleanly even with the sound off.
What was delivered
- Lyric videos for Song of the Year nominees, about 30 to 50 seconds each
- Every video in 1:1, 4:5 and 9:16
- CMA Awards end card on each
How it landed
One video turned into a series. Making the first one good enough that the client asks for more is the best brief a studio can get.
More lyric videos from the series, plus Pride Month and awards night motion.
Design and animation by Greg Stewart, CrispFX, for the CMA via STN Digital.