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Jul

23

Country programming

By Ron Wynn | Filed Under Television 

Martina McBride will literally be all over ABC television for the next couple of weeks. She’s among the featured artists appearing on tonight’s CMA Music Festival: Country’s Night To Rock at 8 p.m. on WKRN-2, then she’ll be spotlighted July 30 in an ABC news special Six Degrees of Martina McBride, also at 8 p.m.. McBride is also the subject of a feature story in the current issue of TV Guide by Alan Light that outlines a hectic day spent with McBride during the recent festival.

This hasn’t been a particularly good summer for the networks. While much of the buzz and attention has gone to cable properties, viewing levels of network shows many weeks have set record lows. Lifetime’s Army Wives, TNT’s The Closer and USA’s Monk, Psych, The 4400 and The Dead Zone are the most talked about programs, while the debuts of new shows featuring A-List actresses Glenn Close and Holly Hunter are also on cable outlets rather than broadcast.

ABC clearly hopes to take some sting out of the debut tonight of Hunter’s program as well as the regular episode of The Closer by giving over the night to McBride and several other prime country performers who fit their youth demographic. These include Brooks & Dunn, Sara Evans, Reba McEntire, Brad Paisley and Carrie Underwood. With the rest of their network competitors heavy in reruns, and the CNN-YouTube Presidential Debate airing two hours earlier, it will be interesting to see whether the CMA Music Festival tops the night’s viewing, what type of rating it gets and whether the audience breakdown satisfies the advertisers.

Meanwhile, for country fans interested in seeing older acts and classic performances from other eras, there’s an outstanding new option available. It’s the six-year-old RFD television network, which is primarily dedicated to covering rural America. But besides their staple of farm and agriculture programs, RFD is airing a wonderful new weekly interview show featuring the legendary country host, author, broadcaster and DJ Ralph Emery.

Each edition has its first run on Monday nights at 6 p.m., then is repeated several other times during the week. There are also rebroadcasts of such magnificent programs as The Porter Wagoner Show, Gaither Gospel Hour, Pop Goes The Country and many others.

There’s just one problem for Nashville viewers. If you don’t have either Dish Network or Direct TV satellite dishes, then you’re out of luck unless you’re in the coverage areas for Mediacom, Charter, NRTC, Bresnan, or NCTC cable. Thus far Comcast has not chosen to add RFD to either its basic or digital lineup, a strange decision considering Music City viewers would seem the natural audience for these shows.

But until they make that addition, Nashville viewers without satellite are denied the opportunity to see the treasures being presented on RFD. Both CMT and GAC are fantastic in terms of what they offer, but watching new Ralph Emery interviews and vintage footage of the Wilburn Brothers on RFD is one of the few things (along with a lower price structure, HBO, Showtime, IFC, the super stations and Encore’s Westerns channel) that make having a satellite dish worthwhile.

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