Sunday, June 14, 2009

CMA Clean Up Thoughts

On the 9 hour drive back from Nashville I had time to think about our trip to the festival and recent opportunities. Hear are a few tid bits of useless info.



1. I just checked Billboard magazine and the American Top 40 Country Charts. Of the forty top songs, I have heard 32 of them "live" by the artist in the last six months and will see another of them in August.



2. Things are so crowded in the restaurants, we shared many a table with others. (Norway, Alabama, Georgia, Ohio, Wisconsin) The couple from Georgia won their trip. They didn't know who the Zac Brown Band was even though ZBB is from Georgia! They didn't get wet Thursday night because they only came to watch Brooks and Dunn and left before Reba took the stage. The Couple from Ohio were in town for a wedding. All this stuff surprised them! The couple from Norway was enjoying the 83 degree weather. They said that summer in Norway was 5 days at 75 degrees! The Couple from Wisconsin were depressing. They had just moved to Tennessee for work in Corrections. The picture they painted of plant closures in the north were very dreary.



3. At the same time 40 to 50 thousand people watched the CMAs, Bonnaroo is going on in Manchester, Tennessee with groups like Bruce Springsteen, Phish, Jimmy Buffett, Elvis Costello, and on and on and has just as many people.



4. Some of the biggest treats of the Festival were:

a. "Little Big Town" doing Fleetwood Mac!

b. Wayonna's whole set. She did Merle Haggard"s "Are the Good Times Over for Good" and then followed it with Aerosmith and then Michael W.Smith's "I can only Imagine" She ruled!



5. Zac Brown doing everything!



6. I became a fan of Jake Owen, Jamie Johnson, and Josh Turner and Little Big Town.



7. The Country Music Hall of Fame is worth it any time I am near!



8. We had to miss the Sunday night show to come home. It included Taylor Swift, Kenny Chesney, Montgomery Gentry, Sugarland and others. We had actually seen all of them at the ACMs in Vegas!

9. This is the only event like it in any form of music and probably sports. Buildings set up just for autographs. Each performer works for free (charity) whether it is at the Stadium or the four other stadiums downtown and at the riverfront and each does at least 30 minutes! There are venues for superstars and up & comers. You can go watch the stars paly in a charity softball game. The program lists 360 performers during the week! This is big! Would not go every year, but would go again!


10. The four teenage girls from Texas that sat two rows in front of us REALLY DO know the words to EVERY COUNTRY song.


I have officially OD'd on Country!

We are switching to Rock for a while!

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