Hunter Hayes and Thompson Square may have a date with history when the CMA Awards are presented on Thursday. Hayes, 21, is vying to become the youngest male solo artist to win as New Artist of the Year. He would swipe the title from Bryan White, who was 22 when he won in 1996 (when the award was called the Horizon Award).

Thompson Square, which consists of Keifer and Shawna Thompson, is vying to become the first husband-wife duo to win in the category. The only other duo to win was the mother-daughter duo The Judds, who won in 1984.

This year's other nominees are Lee Brice, Brantley Gilbert and the duo Love and Theft.

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The CMA Award for Entertainer of the Year is most coveted award in country music. Just 30 acts have won the award through the years—21 male artists, six female artists, two groups and one duo. Garth Brooks and Kenny Chesney are tied for the most wins in the category (four each, though Chesney would take the lead if he wins this year). Barbara Mandrell and Taylor Swift are tied for the most wins by a female artist (two each, though Swift would take the lead is she wins this year).

In 1981, Mandrell became the first artist to win twice. In 1984, Alabama became the first artist to win three times. In 1998, Brooks became the first artist to win four times. (He was also the first artist to regain the title after losing it. Until then, once an artist's winning streak ended, that was it.)

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History may be made in several categories at the 46th annual Country Music Assn. Awards on Thursday. Kenny Chesney is vying for a record-setting fifth award as Entertainer of the Year. Chesney is currently tied for the lead with Garth Brooks, who took Entertainer of the Year four times between 1991 and 1998.

But to win, Chesney will have to get past the reigning champ, Taylor Swift. Swift, who also won in this category in 2009, is vying to become the first woman to take Entertainer of the Year three times. She would surpass Barbara Mandrell, who won twice in 1980-1981.

Eric Church's "Springsteen," which topped Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart for two weeks in June, is nominated for Single of the Year, Song of the Year and Music Video of the Year. It's the year's only work to receive nominations in all three categories. It's vying to become only the third hit in CMA history to sweep all three awards. The first two were Alan Jackson's "Chattahoochee" in 1993-1994 and Brooks &

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Rapper Snoop Dogg performs on stage during a concert in Arendal, some 250 km (155 miles) south of Oslo, June 28, 2012. REUTERS/Toer Erik Schroder/NTB ScanpixTwo unlikely artists are in the running for CMA Awards on Thursday. Pop veteran Kelly Clarkson is a surprise finalist for Female Vocalist of the Year. Rap icon Snoop Dogg is up for Musical Event of the Year for his role in Willie Nelson's "Roll Me Up And Smoke Me When I Die," which also features Kris Kristofferson and Jamey Johnson. Snoop Dogg (a.k.a. Snoop Lion) has collaborated with everyone from Dr. Dre and Akon to Katy Perry and the Pussycat Dolls. But country is a stretch. He would be one of the most unlikely artists ever to win a CMA Award.

Clarkson and Jason Aldean won a CMA award at last year's show for their smash "Don't You Wanna Stay." The song, which spent three weeks at #1 on Hot Country Songs in March 2011, won as Musical Event of the Year. Clarkson landed her first major country hit in 2007 when she and Reba McEntire teamed for a duet version of Clarkson's 2005 pop hit "Because Of You." The remake reached #2 on the country chart and was nominated for a CMA Award. But

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Everyone loves to dress up for Halloween--and that goes for everyone in Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood's famous household, as well! Yearwood, along with two of her teenaged stepdaughters, showed off her holiday spirit when she dressed up heavy-metal style for a new episode of her Food Network cooking show Trisha's Southern Kitchen.

L-R: August Brooks, Allie Brooks, Yearwood, and friend Kim LeFlore (Photo: Food Network)

Yep, that's August and Allie Brooks (who are 18 and 16, respectively), along with a family friend, who joined the Grammy-winning country diva to paint themselves up as the members of iconic rock band KISS.

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Taylor talks with Yahoo!In the conclusion of Yahoo! Music's interview with Taylor Swift, we query the singer about her beguiling new single "Begin Again"—and how that contrasts with some earlier songs that were more about rough landings than sweet beginnings. Has she really gotten over her attraction to the "Treacherous" type? We'll let her explain.

YAHOO! MUSIC: "Begin Again" strikes me as being kind of the opposite of "The Way I Loved You," from the Fearless album.Then, you were contrasting the good guy you were with in the song with a less polite guy you were with before—and thinking about how you liked the bad guy better. "Begin Again" is looking back at the bad boy and thinking how you like the new, nice guy better.

SWIFT: That's an awesome, awesome observation. That's a really cool observation. I think that might be kind of growing up. When you think about the song on Fearless, "The Way I Loved You," you're reminiscing about the passion and the heated arguments and the dysfunction of a dysfunctional

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Taylor Swift nearly kept the cancer-themed ballad "Ronan" in her drawer forever, thinking it was "too sad to ever sing again" after she first wrote it, she tells Yahoo! Music.

"Ronan" isn't included on her new album, Red, but it's still part of the national conversation after she debuted it in September on the Stand Up to Cancer telecast. While we were asking her about Red, we also had to inquire about what led her to unexpectedly debut this non-album cut on national television less than two months before her album was coming out.

"Writing 'Ronan' was something that I did very quietly," Swift told us. "And I only played it for a few people when I wrote it almost a year and a half ago, because it was really hard for me to get through. It was hard for me to record. It was hard emotionally to present that song. When it came time to play Stand Up to Cancer, Gwyneth (Paltrow, the show's executive producer) reached out to me and said 'I really want you to be a part of this'— and immediately

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Swift and DeGeneres (The Ellen DeGeneres Show)There's plenty of fodder for discussion regarding Taylor Swift this week--after all, the country/pop cutie has just released her fourth album, Red, which has already spawned several rapid-fire hits and is anticipated to crack 1 million in first-week sales. However, when the superstar appeared on the Ellen DeGeneres show Thursday, DeGeneres just skipped to what fans really want to talk about: Boys, of course.

In fact, DeGeneres teased Swift so mercilessly about the subject--to the point of playing a slideshow of the singer's past flames--that Swift actually had a mini-breakdown on air.

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