Vince Gill, Mel Tillis and Ralph Emery have been selected for induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

The three honourees were at a Tuesday morning news conference at the Hall’s Ford Theater, with Mayor Bill Purcell and luminaries including Barbara Mandrell, Brenda Lee and Hall of Fame Director Kyle Young. on hand to offer words of praise and respect. Each inductee received standing ovations from a crowd composed of industry figures and some museum visitors who wandered into the building expecting to see historical exhibits and wound up watching history being made.

Gill, who was joined by his wife, Amy Grant, said he was overwhelmed. “Out of all the things you’ve ever done – it just matters, it matters so much,” the 50 year-old country star said in an emotional speech. “We’re so blessed to get to be able to do this.” Upon getting the good news from Country Music Association Chief Operating Officer Tammy Genovese several weeks ago, Gill responded by getting in his car, tuning in to a country oldies show on satellite radio and weeping while driving around Nashville.

Gill, 50, serves as the president of the Hall of Fame and Museum’s Board of Officers and Trustees, but that board has nothing to do with electing artists. Inductees are chosen by the CMA’s panel of more than 300 anonymous electors, and the elections are done in categories. Gill enters as a “Career Achieved National Prominence Between 1975 and the Present” artist, while Tillis received a “Between World War II and 1975” nod and Emery joins as a “Non-Performer”.

“I could recite a phone book full of people that deserve to be in here before I do,” said Gill, whose prodigious musical skills are matched by his knowledge of and affection for musicians who came before him. Gill has won more GRAMMY® Awards than any other male country artist and has won 18 CMA Awards, but none of his trophies can match knowing that his Hall of Fame plaque will hang on the same wall as the plaques that read “Chet Atkins” and “The Carter Family.”

Gill’s GRAMMY®-nominated Breathe Of Heaven will be available at Canadian Christian retail on September 25th.