In the face of a continual stepping-up of country concert activities in Branson, Mo., the Opryland USA family entertainment complex recently announced a 284-show series for 1992 that is being billed as the biggest musical event in Nashville history.
Two shows are scheduled for each day of the 1992 season. An extra $5 added to the park`s adult admission of $21.95 entitles an Opryland guest to a reserved concert seat.
The concert series opens March 28 with Larry Gatlin & the Gatlin Brothers and closes Nov. 1 with Little Texas.
In between are current Country Music Association award winners such as Vince Gill, Tanya Tucker, Ricky Skaggs and Steve Wariner; and a host of other big solo names such as Patty Loveless, Ronnie Milsap, Lorrie Morgan, Conway Twitty and Crystal Gayle.
The schedule also includes such well-known groups as the Charlie Daniels Band, Highway 101, Diamond Rio, Restless Heart, Wild Rose and Sweethearts of the Rodeo; and hot solo artists Trisha Yearwood, Pam Tillis, Marty Stuart, Lionel Cartwright and Shelby Lynne.
More information is available from Opryland Customer Service, 2802 Opryland Drive, Nashville, Tenn. 37214; or by calling 615-889-6611.
On the record: If you`re wondering who the Buzzin` Cousins are on John Mellencamp`s single ”Sweet Suzanne,” wonder no more: They`re Mellencamp, James McMurtry and alternative-country notables Dwight Yoakam, John Prine and Joe Ely. . . . Shenandoah, long involved in legal problems involving its former contract with Sony Records, recently signed with RCA. Its first RCA album is due out May 12. . . . Emmylou Harris` new home video package ”At the Ryman” (Warner Reprise) captures Harris` performance at Nashville`s historic Ryman Auditorium with her acoustic band, the Nash Ramblers, as well as backstage conversation footage with Harris and the Ramblers. . . . Song title of the week: ”Bless Your Cheatin` Heart” by B. Cannon and J. Boucher.
Randy Travis (who will perform Feb. 21 at the Rosemont Horizon with Alan Jackson and Trisha Yearwood) says that in addition to his current single,
”Better Class of Losers,” and a couple of other cuts on the current Travis album ”High Lonesome,” he and Jackson have written several other songs, including some Jackson is planning to record.
Travis says that writing with someone else isn`t always easy but that he and Jackson have been very productive together.
”We grew up listening to and liking the same singers, like Hank Williams,” he explains.
On the road: Hometown boy Clint Black becomes the first artist ever to perform three shows at the Houston Livestock Show Feb. 21 and 22. Another native Texas sensation, George Strait, has done two consecutive shows at the event for the last few years. . . . Speaking of Strait, he is using Pam Tillis on a lot of his shows this year. Tillis wickedly kids the females in Strait`s audiences about their hero. . . . Another electric stage performer about whom a buzz has started is Louisianan Sammy Kershaw, whose hot new single, ”Don`t Go Near the Water,” follows the big hit ”Cadillac Style”-and who is scheduled to perform Feb. 28 at the Clearwater Saloon on North Lincoln Avenue. Becky ”The Beckaroo” Hobbs and her band, the Heartthrobs, will break some new ground in March and April on a five-week country tour of Africa under the auspices of the U.S. Information Agency`s Arts America program. The tour- which is scheduled to visit Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Swaziland, Lesotho and Maritius-will feature Hobbs and her aggregation performing for presidents, ambassadors, fellow musicians and the public.
Et cetera: Dwight Yoakam stepped in to replace Lee Greenwood on Sunday`s segment of the NBC-TV series ”Hot Country Nights” after Greenwood became ill. . . . Ronna Reeves-a Texan whose album ”The More I Learn” is due in March-says the week she was to audition for Mercury Records, her lead guitarist quit and she hired a replacement who didn`t have time to learn all her material. The audition show was ”really horrible,” she says, but she was offered a contract anyway. She says Mercury executives later explained to her that ”anybody who could withstand what you did and do as well as you did deserves a record deal.”
