Taylor Swift has seen a lot of firsts in her career. At the American Music Awards last night (Nov. 23) in Los Angeles, she did it again; she was the first-ever recipient of the American Music Awards Dick Clark Award for Excellence. The inaugural award is named for the veteran host and music impresario who started the AMAs back in 1972.
Show creators said the new award was made to recognize "an artist who achieves a groundbreaking feat or creates a landmark work. It is to be bestowed upon someone whose spirit and excellence capture the visionary passion that Dick Clark himself incorporated into everything he did," according to the LA Times.
AMA execs said that Swift received the award because her latest album, "1989," sold 1.287 million copies in its first week, making her the first artist ever to post three albums with sales exceeding 1 million copies out of the gate.
See Swift receive the award here:
Swift performed her new single, "Blank Space," which this week gave her another first when it replaced her previous single, "Shake It Off," in the No. 1 position on Billboard's Hot 100. That makes Swift the first woman to replace herself in the top spot of rankings of the nation's best-selling singles.
Clark, the longtime host of "American Bandstand," created the AMAs as a counterpart to the Grammy Awards, which aim to recognize artistic excellence, according to the LA Times. Clark's show was designed to salute fan favorites with awards reflecting sales of the year's biggest hits.
Clark did get to see Swift perform before his passing. According to his wife, Kari Clark, it would've made her late husband very happy to see Taylor honored in this way.
"The first time Dick saw Taylor perform, he knew she was something special," she said. "He would be thrilled to know she is the first artist to receive the Dick Clark Award for Excellence."
