When people ask “Nashville” star Charles “Chip” Esten for the must-sees when visiting Music City, he lists two places — the Grand Ole Opry and the Bluebird Cafe.
Both venues have figured prominently in the ABC drama that follows the careers and romances of a cast of aspiring and bona fide country music stars. So when ABC was looking for a special to ramp up excitement about the show’s final three episodes of the season, it seemed fitting to
turn to those two touchstones of the city and show.
The result is the “Nashville: On the Record” concert special airing April 23 at 10 p.m., which features cast members performing tunes from the show at the famed Ryman Auditorium (the former home of the Opry) and sitting down at the set’s re-created version of the Bluebird with the
songwriters for a look at their process.
The show’s all-original soundtrack has been its hallmark since Episode 1, distinguishing it from other musical series like “Glee” that trade in covers (and grounding it when its soapy storylines start to go off the rails). And viewers have responded — the show’s original songs have sold more than 3 million downloads on iTunes.
“The songs are woven into our show,” says Esten, who plays self-destructive guitarist Deacon Claybourne. “They’re not buttons on the fabric, they’re in the fabric. They move the story forward and they advance the characters’ relationships.”
Wednesday’s special, taped March 29, grew out of ABC’s “On the Record” web series, which spotlights the original music of “Nashville,” explaining how the network finds the songs from writers based in Nashville. The cast — most of whom write songs themselves — also speaks about how they pertain to the plot.
“What came out of the digital series is that the actors, in their spare time they’re playing the Opry with some of the songwriters they met from the show,” says ABC Digital Studio producer Brian Loschiavo. “That’s when we saw the big opportunity to showcase that and show that these people really are singing, they really are performing — this isn’t them lip-syncing.”
Producers chose songs for the special that were fan favorites and could incorporate all the actors available (everyone except Lennon and Maisy Stella and Connie Britton) while paying homage to both seasons of the show.
“This year, we had [music producer] Buddy Miller, a different flavor than [Season 1 music producer] T Bone Burnett,” says Sam Palladio, who plays songwriter Gunnar Scott. “There were rootsier elements in Season 1, and in Season 2 the music was more on the popular side of country.”
The resulting eight-song set list includes two tracks from Season 1 — the haunting duet “If I Didn’t Know Better,” performed by Palladio and Clare Bowen in the show’s pilot, and Hayden Panettiere’s ballad “Nothing in This World Will Ever Break My Heart Again.” The rest are from Season 2, opening with “It’s On Tonight” by Esten, Chris Carmack and Will Chase and closing out with a full-cast rendition of “A Life That’s Good.”
“It was so much fun playing in the Ryman. That’s sort of a hallowed venue,” says Carmack, who plays closeted crooner Will Lexington. “It’s kind of
a career high right now. It’s a really special thing and none of us take it for granted. If it looks like we’re having fun out there, it’s ’cause we are.”
All that excitement will be captured in the special through candid backstage footage with the cast. “You get to see them come offstage and have those moments of ‘Oh my gosh, we just sang on the Ryman stage together,’ ” says Dawn Soler, senior VP of music at ABC.
It also marked the first time that many in the close-knit cast had heard the songs performed live (most see their castmates’ songs for the first
time when they air on TV).
“When [Clare and Sam] were singing [“If I Didn’t Know Better”], Jonathan, Will and I came out of our dressing rooms on the fourth floor to stand at the top of the Ryman and watch them sing,” Esten says. “That [song] was real early in the show and we thought this thing could turn out to be
pretty special, and I think and hope it is.”
The Ryman concert (a soundtrack version of which will be released on iTunes April 22) was also a test run of sorts for the show’s upcoming sold-out three-city tour that will stop in New York at the Best Buy Theater on May 6.
“I think we’re going to obviously reach for some crowd favorites from the season. We might even have an opportunity in time to play some original songs,” says Carmack, who will hit the road with Esten, Bowen, Jackson and Palladio on April 25. “The Ryman had to be really specifically planned… This is going to be a little bit looser of a format.”