Sep
27
Loretta Lynn photo courtesy of Sony Music Nashville.
Five decades ago, Loretta Lynn and her husband-manager, “Mooney” Lynn, drove station to station around the U.S. promoting her first single, “I’m A Honky Tonk Girl.” All these years later, she’s a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame and a global symbol for country music, and she was honored Friday at her Coal Miner’s Daughter Museum in Tennessee for 50 years as an American icon.
A bevy musicians and music-industry executives were on hand for the occasion, including Marty Stuart, Crystal Gayle, Jack Greene and Terri Clark. Ronnie McDowell presented Loretta a painting he had created, depicting her when she was 10 years old and living in Kentucky. A string of presenters included John Carter Cash, arranger Bill Walker and Ray Walker, of the Jordanaires, the Hall of Fame vocal quartet that backed Loretta on such classics as “You’re Lookin’ At Country,” “Blue Kentucky Girl,” “Don’t Come Home A-Drinkin’ (With Lovin’ On Your Mind)” and “Coal Miner’s Daughter.”
There were also video tributes from Wynonna, Big Kenny, Keith Anderson, Martina McBride, Kellie Pickler and Dolly Parton. The ceremony took place in a sweat-filled tent outside the museum. The museum houses an extraordinary volume of memorabilia, including letters from presidents, stage wear and a string of awards — none of which have led Loretta to think of herself as anything other than the little girl who grew up in poverty in an eastern Kentucky shack.
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May
5
Keith Urban on stage at his "All For The Hall" benefit concert at the Sommet Center in Nashville, TN on October 13, 2009
After several days of devastating flooding, Nashville has begun digging out, surveying the damage caused by dirty, rising water after a catastrophic downpour.
The Grand Ole Opry House is likely closed for weeks — maybe months — with water so deep that someone paddled a canoe over the seats, Marty Stuart told the Associated Press. The Country Music Hall of Fame, which has water in its Ford Theater, lost power and is running a generator to maintain temperatures inside the building to keep its fragile artifacts from being destroyed. A facility where Keith Urban was storing his concert equipment was inaccessible, and Keith believes he lost all of his guitars and amps.
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Apr
2
Ray Stevens photo courtesy of myspace.com/raystevensmusic.
He sings songs that rhyme “Pascagoula” with “hallelujah,” changes voices in his novelty titles and had one of his biggest-selling hits by celebrating a naked man streaking through the fruits-and-vegetables section at the local supermarket.
You can’t really fight the notion of Ray Stevens making an April Fools Day appearance on the Grand Ole Opry’s Country Classics. Ray was, in fact, just a part of the tomfoolery at the Ryman Auditorium Thursday from host Larry Gatlin, Jeff Bates, Jack Greene and comedian Mike Snider, among others.
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Oct
6
Mandy Barnett photo courtesy of http://www.myspace.com/mandycarolbarnett.
If you’re in Nashville this week, get your ticket to the Grand Ole Opry’s “Country Classics” show on Thursday, October 8 at 7 p.m. (Central), hosted by GAC’s own Storme Warren.
As part of the Opry’s 84th Birthday Weekend, Thursday’s theme is ”songs that made the Grand Ole Opry famous.”
The lineup includes Mandy Barnett, Jack Greene, George Hamilton IV, Jan Howard, Hal Ketchum, Jim Lauderdale, the Del McCoury Band, the Opry Square Dancers, Jeannie Seely and Sunny Sweeney.
What can you expect at the show? You’ll hear Mandy singing the Ernest Tubb classic, “Walkin’ the Floor Over You,” Continue Reading
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