LISTEN: Atlanta music executive Tammy Hurt talks at length with GPB's Kristi York Wooten about her recent honors, women's role in Atlanta's music scene, music advocacy and her favorite Grammy Awards moment.
Tammy Hurt is enjoying her season of recognition — with gratitude.
The drummer and advocate cofounded Georgia Music Partners and is finishing her four-year term as chair of the Board of Trustees for the Recording Academy (aka the Grammy Awards).
She is a true Georgia musician: Hurt was in the Wheeler High School Marching Band Wildcats in Cobb County, Ga., then went to college in South Carolina and ultimately got her start back in Atlanta in a band called Paper Dolls (previously Scallion Sisters) and came up in the Atlanta music scene at the same time as the Indigo Girls.
On March 29, Hurt was named as a top executive on the 2025 Billboard Women in Music list following an announcement days earlier that she was included on a list by She Is the Music, an organization cofounded by Alicia Keys that works with women producers, engineers and other behind-the-scenes jobs in the music industry.
She told GPB she was already overwhelmed with receiving the two honors in the same week, but then she also received a surprise proclamation from the Atlanta City Council on April 2.
"Anytime you get recognition, it feels good to be appreciated," she said. "You know, I'm the sort of person that puts my head down and does the work, but it was really an amazing experience to be listed on the Billboard Women in Music list, the executive list, and also the She Is the Music list... and I was one of 50 on that list. So, I was definitely grateful…and I'm amongst a list of incredible women."
The next morning, Hurt posted a message on her Facebook about the onslaught of appreciation: "About last night…. A truly unforgettable night made possible by the incomparable @katgraham @phillanawilliams and @collinsforatlanta Not only did Kat surprise me with a beautiful celebration for being named as a 2025 @billboard Woman In Music, I was presented with a proclamation from the Atlanta City Council by Phillana and Eshe. It is still difficult to fully comprehend it all. Thank you to everyone who was able to make it out last night. You made me feel so special and so loved. I thank you from the bottom of my great big heart!! I will be forever grateful."
As for her work with the Recording Academy, she said a favorite memory outside of the boardroom or Capitol Hill was the night of the 2024 Grammy Awards.
"I have to say, one of my most favorite Grammy moments was the Tracy Chapman/ Luke Combs "Fast Car" duo," she recalled. "Because I had seen that performance in rehearsal. I knew it was coming... but there was something very different that happened in that room at that time in that moment. and just just watching that performance: Tracy Chapman, an LGBTQ African-American woman in the music industry and Luke Combs, country music star, up there together. It just was so symbolic. I just lost it, like I was overcome with joy and emotion and it just wasn't such an incredible moment.
"So, I had to do a quick touch-up and I actually ran into Luke Combs after that performance backstage and I said, 'Let me thank you for your incredible performance, but I'm also really upset with you because you made me cry all my makeup off.' Grammy moments are pretty special when they happen."
