The Springsteen Center's 2026 American Music Honorees: Here come the bands, and some raised eyebrows

February 14, 2026

This week's announcement of the Bruce Springsteen Center for American Music's 2026 American Music Honorees marks some new directions for the annual ceremony, raising some questions - and at least a few eyebrows - in the process. All honorees will be recognized at the Center's fourth annual American Music Honors event, taking place once again in Pollak Theatre, on the campus of Monmouth University, on Saturday, April 18.

In alphabetical order, and as per the official announcement, the 2026 honorees are:

The Doors - "a defining force of late-1960s rock, blending blues, psychedelia, and literary ambition into music that challenged conventions and expanded the possibilities of the genre." (award to be presented by Stevie Van Zandt)

Dr. Dre - "a pioneering producer, artist, and entrepreneur who helped shape the sound of hip-hop and launched the careers of some of the genre’s most influential voices." (award to be presented by Jimmy Iovine)

The E Street Band - "one of the most enduring and influential ensembles in American rock history, with a body of work that has given voice to working-class stories for over five decades." (award to be presented by Jon Landau)

Patti Smith - "a visionary artist and poet whose groundbreaking work fused punk, poetry, and rock into a powerful new language of artistic expression." (award to be presented by Bruce Springsteen)

Dionne Warwick - "one of the most influential vocalists in American popular music, known for her elegant phrasing and emotional precision." (award to be presented by Bruce Springsteen)

This is the first year that bands have been included among the honorees. It also is the first year in which the ceremony will include "a special posthumous [musical] tribute" to a non-honoree, saluting a band of which only one member was a U.S. citizen. (Of course, as Bad Bunny reminded more than 128 million U.S. viewers last Sunday, being "American" doesn't necessarily require being a U.S. citizen.)

"The Band," reads the official announcement, "—despite all but one member being Canadians—reshaped American roots music by drawing from folk, blues, country, and rock to create a deeply influential and distinctly American sound."

So, on to the eyebrow-raising... First off, of course the E Street Band is beloved on this site, for obvious reasons. Nevertheless, presenting this fine group of musicians with their own American Music Honor award(s) comes across as both unnecessary and contrived. Yes, it's true that E Street Band member Stevie Van Zandt was among the initial group of honorees in 2023, but he was recognized (and deservedly so) for much more than just his E Street Band membership. As great as the E Street Band is, along with the great individual "off-E-Street" accomplishments of many of the group's past and present members, the E Street Band itself still has no significant identity of its own beyond being the key musical collaborators and support for many (though not all) of Bruce Springsteen's greatest musical achievements. In fact, the E Street Band (or at least a significant number of its core members) has assembled and worked on only a handful of performances and officially released recordings without Bruce Springsteen, tracks like Ronnie Spector's 1977 version of "Say Goodbye To Hollywood," Darlene Love's 1992 single "All Alone On Christmas," etc. Excellent recordings, for sure, but there certainly aren't anywhere near enough of those to consist of any kind of significant historical legacy separate from and outside of the band's work with Springsteen.

When The Bruce Springsteen Center for American Music opens its new building this spring, a large portion of its exhibit space will be devoted permanently to the E Street Band, and rightly so. But given that the band already is slated to be recognized by the Center in this fashion, presenting them with an American Music Honor on top of that feels like... well, overkill, quite frankly. It seems just shy of presenting Bruce Springsteen himself with an American Music Honor from his own Center for American Music, in terms of cringeworthiness.

And then there's the honor being presented to The Doors. In his Born to Run memoir, Springsteen wrote about seeing The Doors at Convention Hall in Asbury Park. "There," wrote Bruce, "as a young aspiring musician, I’d seen the Doors with Jim Morrison, whose live presence and command of the stage completely engulfed you..." And at the end of the Road Diary film, Springsteen quotes a line of Jim Morrison's poetry from the title track of Morrison's posthumously released An American Prayer album, with music by the surviving members of The Doors (as of 1978.)

Yet while The Doors obviously hold some personal significance to Bruce Springsteen, selecting them as the first band - other than the E Street Band - to receive an American Music Honor award doesn't feel very much in line with The Springsteen Center's stated purpose of The American Music Honors: to celebrate "artists who have demonstrated artistic excellence, creative integrity, and a longstanding commitment to the value of music in our national consciousness."

Ironically, Jon Landau - back in his rock-critic days - was among those who best articulated The Doors' limitations. In his 1968 essay "Rock and Art," republished in It's Too Late To Stop Now: A Rock and Roll Journal (an anthology of his late-1960s writings published in 1972,) Landau lamented the rise of so-called "high art" sensibilities and pretensions in the music, which, as he wrote, "created the kind of piety and solemnity which is often rock's worst enemy." For Landau, the music of The Doors epitomized the problem:

"To me, [The Doors] sum up what a completely dead end this side of popular music is. Their lyrics are invariably pretense... The whole mess is labelled the theater of rock, and we are all supposed to marvel at how The Doors have brought the artist and the audience closer together.

"Compare to that the earlier or perhaps the current Stones... It isn't this cute and aimless washed-out antiseptic organ music. There is something about their 'I can't get no satisfaction' which transcends The Doors' pale attempts at affecting a similar stance. The Stones have the authenticity, while The Doors wind up playing music that, to these ears, sounds as close to rock as professional wrestling is to sports."

Ouch! Guess that helps to explain why Stevie Van Zandt - and not Jon Landau - will be handling the American Music Honor award presentation to The Doors.

Of course, Dr. Dre, Patti Smith, and Dionne Warwick are all worthy American Music Honors recipients, and the posthumous musical tribute to The Band certainly is an interesting idea/approach, especially given how great a house-band the Disciples of Soul remains. It also raises the intriguing possibility of future such tributes to other greats of American music who are no longer with us, whether U.S.-born or not, but whose work nevertheless has had an enduring influence on American music. Therefore, despite our justifiably raised eyebrows, we also are still looking forward to another entertaining and enlightening spring evening in West Long Branch, NJ.

Tickets for the fourth annual American Music Honors will go on sale to the public online on Wednesday, March 18 at 12pm ET. As the onsale date and time grow closer, you'll be able to click here for more detailed ticket information.