NBC renews contract to broadcast iHeartRadio Music Awards

The iHeartRadio Music Awards stole NBC’s heart, with the network announcing Tuesday that it would pick up the show for 2015.

Last week’s telecast attracted 5.4 million viewers, a disappointing figure considering the 65 million fan votes that were logged for winners (and boasted about during the telecast).

Ratings may have been soft, but the inaugural telecast delivered some star power worth noting.

Pitbull, Ariana Grande, Shakira, Kendrick Lamar, Blake Shelton and Pharrell Williams were among the night’s performers, and awards were handed to most of the performers (surprise!), as well as Avicii and Rihanna, who was the night’s big winner with four honors.

Touted by radio conglomerate Clear Channel, the show was its entry in an already crowded market of telecasts vying to be the viral, fun alternative to the prestigious Grammys. Did the experiment work? We weren’t completely convinced.

“We are incredibly proud of last week’s show and our collaboration with Clear Channel. We brought together the most relevant musicians of our time for a special and very successful evening and can’t wait to do it again,” Paul Telegdy, NBC president of alternative and late-night programming, said in a statement.

Executive producers for the iHeartRadio Awards were John Sykes and Tom Poleman of Clear Channel Media and Entertainment, Ryan Seacrest Productions and Ian Stewart and Hamish Hamilton of Done and Dusted Inc., who will produce the show for NBC Studios.

In case producers want notes on what to improve for next year, we did some of the grunt work already.