December 18, 2020 • No Comments • Country Music News

ABC/Image Group LAAs Christmas nears, Russell Dickerson is playing secret Santa for a 17-year-old fan.

Over the summer, a teenage Utah native named Sarah Frei was driving with her friends when they were hit head-on by a drunk driver. Sarah became paralyzed from the waist down and lost both her legs.

She’s also a huge fan of Russell’s music: So much so that, while she was recuperating from her injuries in the hospital, her school’s cheerleading squad created a special routine set to the singer’s “Home Sweet,” which is Sarah’s favorite song.

When the country star heard her story, he wanted to do something special for his young fan.

“To see the joy, and to see the zeal for life still that she had…it just drew me in and captured me, and I was in,” Russell explains. He decided to team up with Chevrolet to surprise Sarah with a 2021 Chevrolet Traverse with all the amenities to suit her needs, including maximized cabin space and a fully-powered and lighted ramp.

“My manager told me, one of the first things Sarah said when she got out of surgery was, ‘Will I ever be able to drive again?’” the singer continues. “I was like, ‘What can we do to just absolutely make her life? How can we just blow her mind?’”

This week, Russell hopped on a Zoom call with Sarah and her mom to surprise her with her Christmas gift: A brand new car that she’ll be able to drive.

“Home Sweet” comes off the track list of the singer’s sophomore album, Southern Symphony, which came out this month.

By Carena Liptak
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

December 18, 2020 • No Comments • Country Music News

ABC/Image Group LAEarlier in 2020, Jimmie Allen released his landmark Bettie James EP. The star-studded project saw him collaborating with country legends like Tim McGraw and Brad Paisley, newcomers like Mickey Guyton, and out-of-genre greats like Nelly, Rita Wilson and Noah Cyrus.

Now, Jimmie’s taking Bettie James one step further. The singer unveiled a half-hour-long mini-movie called Bettie James Picture this week, which was written by the singer himself and directed by Sam Aldrich.

Jimmie also stars in the musical film, following a working-class citizen as he goes through a typical day of work, relaxation and more. In one emotional moment, Jimmie visits a veterans’ cemetery as his song “Why Things Happen,” a collaboration with Charley Pride and Darius Rucker, plays. He kneels beside a stone reading “James E. Allen,” which is the name of the singer’s dad and one half of the EP’s namesake.

The other half, “Bettie,” comes from Jimmie’s beloved grandmother, Bettie Snead.

The Bettie James EP first came out back in July. It follows two successful singles, “Best Shot” and “Make We Want To,” which both peaked at the top of the country charts.

By Carena Liptak
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

December 18, 2020 • No Comments • Country Music News

ABCCarrie Underwood and John Legend’s holiday duet, “Hallelujah,” will be featured in the Empire State Building’s annual music and light show in New York City. Ahead of the debut of the festive show Saturday night, you can get a sneak peek of all the dazzling holiday magic now.

At the end of the new clip, Carrie offers a special holiday message for fans.

“I love this song because I feel like it encompasses so much about Christmas,” the singer says. “You have this love aspect of it, it just feels like Christmas, it just makes you smile and to say ‘Hallelujah’ is just beautiful.”

“Hallelujah” is one of the tracks included on Carrie’s My Gift, her first holiday album, which arrived in September. The project features a handful of original songs as well as her spin on some cherished Christmas classics, including a duet with her five-year-old son, Isaiah, on “Little Drummer Boy.”

The light show, created by renowned lighting designer Marc Brickman, will be unveiled in full on Saturday, and will continue to be synced live each night at 8 p.m. ET through Christmas Day. If you’re not local to the New York area, you can watch along on EarthCam.

By Carena Liptak
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

December 18, 2020 • No Comments • Country Music News

John Shearer/Getty Images for Essential Broadcast Media, LLCGarth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood performed their first live concert event of 2020, Garth & Trisha Live!, earlier in the pandemic as a means of bringing fans together even, though they were physically apart.

Now, the superstar couple are at it again, this time with an extra dose of holiday cheer. Their Garth & Trisha Live! A Holiday Concert Event special airs this Sunday night on CBS. Ahead of the show, Garth acknowledges that having to be apart from loved ones will make this holiday season extra tough.

“At the end of the year, we just want to be surrounded by family and friends. And what’s going on? The pandemic is at its highest point,” he says, but adds that there’s still a silver lining to Christmas this year.

“It’s still going to be — maybe more than ever — a time to reflect, a time to be thankful, a time to be grateful…for…what…you…have. I love that about this time of year,” the singer points out. “And my prayer is that everybody stays safe, and everybody walks into ‘21 better from 2020 than worse off from it.”

Garth & Trisha Live! A Holiday Concert Event will air on CBS on Sunday at 8:30PM ET. Following the show, CBS will air its all-genre musical A Home for the Holidays special, which includes a performance from Miranda Lambert.

By Carena Liptak
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

December 18, 2020 • No Comments • Country Music News

Big MachineFor the 2020 Christmas season, Lady A‘s holiday album, On This Winter’s Night, grows to a mammoth sixteen cuts, as the band adds four new tracks for the record’s Deluxe Edition.  

It was important to the “Champagne Night” hitmakers that the new additions be unique.

“Anybody that has our Christmas record, you know, there’s a lot of very familiar Christmas songs,” Charles Kelley explains. “And we wanted to find a couple that were familiar, but there hasn’t been a ton of covers of, you know.”

“And there really hasn’t been that many covers of “Little Saint Nick” [by the Beach Boys] or Paul McCartney‘s [“Wonderful Christmastime”] much at all,” he continues. “And so we thought that’d be kind of different and unique.”

Since the album came out in 2012, Charles, Hillary Scott, and Dave Haywood have all had kids.

“We wrote an original,” Dave points out. “The three of us sat down and wrote a song called ‘Christmas Through Your Eyes’ about kind of regaining the magic of seeing Christmas through the eyes of our children, which was a really fun write.”

Lady A also covers an obscure song used in Christmas Vacation.

“You remember the scene where Chevy Chase gets locked up in the attic and he’s playing the little reels?” Charles asks. “Well, there’s this Ray Charles song called “Spirit of Christmas,” and you can’t even find it anywhere.”

“But if you go on the internet, you can find like a YouTube clip of it,” he says. “But it’s such an amazing song, and Ray Charles, like, is just one of my idols. And so I said, ‘Man, I’ve always wanted to try this.'”

Longtime Lady A fans may remember On This Winter’s Night grew out of the A Merry Little Christmas EP from 2010.

By Stephen Hubbard
Copyright © 2020, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.