Some of country music’s greatest voices come together for A Nashville Christmas, getTV’s first original special! Wynonna, Emmylou Harris, Lorrie Morgan, and Pam Tillis headline the centerpiece of our “Most Wonderful Month Of The Year” celebration, performing a dozen traditional carols, pop hits, and songs of the season.

An homage to the classic variety shows getTV viewers love, A Nashville Christmas was recorded in an intimate, cabaret-style setting in Music City, USA. In addition to an hour of great music, the country legends also share stories and memories that are sure to warm your heart.

“There’s nothing like friends and family here in Nashville celebrating the holiday,” Emmylou Harris says, opening the show with “The First Noel” (accompanied by vocalists Pam Rose and Mary Ann Kennedy). A 13-time Grammy winner, Harris has been a popular recording artist for nearly half a century and is still going strong. Her Christmas album Light Of The Stable is a holiday perennial, and the Country Hall-Of-Famer performs the title track from that 1979 record on A Nashville Christmas. She also reinterprets her favorite Dolly Parton song as a testament to the spirit of holiday giving.    

“This song has never really been considered a traditional Christmas song,” Harris says of Parton’s “Coat Of Many Colors,” a track she first covered in 1975 on her album Pieces Of The Sky. “But why can’t it be?”

Have some tissues standing by when Wynonna introduces Harris for “Beautiful Star Of Bethlehem,” her first-ever duet with a woman she calls one of her first sheroes.

“I know everything you’ve ever sung,” Wynonna says, wiping a tear. “And here I am, all these years later, standing next to you. I just think that’s pretty cool.”

Wynonna first came to prominence in the early 1980s alongside her mother Naomi in The Judds before embarking on a career as a solo artist in 1991. The native of rural Ashland, Kentucky has gone on to become a crossover superstar with eight studio albums, a live album, a Christmas album, and two compilation releases, plus more than 20 singles. She demonstrates the soulful pipes that have made her a hitmaker for 35 years on “Let’s Make A Baby King,” a rocking hymn she first recorded in 1993.

For many of the performers in A Nashville Christmas, music is part of their DNA. But for Pam Tillis, there’s special poignancy in her appearance this year. Pam’s father, country music icon Mel Tillis, passed away on November 19 after a six-decade career that culminated with a National Medal of Arts in 2012. Mel gave Pam her start in the 1970s and they performed together frequently in the years since.  

“We all realize how lucky we are to be here,” Pam says as she joins Grammy-winning Gospel artist Ashley Cleveland on stage. “We’re still making music after all these years.”

Tillis and Cleveland first performed together as a duo while the two were students at the University of Tennessee in 1977. In the decades since, Tillis has released 17 albums and 36 singles and won a Grammy and a Country Music Association Award. Tillis and Cleveland perform “Take A Walk Through Bethlehem,” a gorgeous B.J. Thomas ballad that demonstrates the depth and power of their lifelong creative chemistry. Tillis also rocks out on “Santa Claus Baby” with able accompaniment by the house ensemble, the SVL Allstars Band.

Speaking of legacy, Lorrie Morgan, daughter of country music singer George Morgan, charted her first hit in 1978 and has had more than 25 singles on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks charts since. The Nashville native has recorded more than 15 studio albums, including Come See Me And Come Lonely, a new album of duets with Pam Tillis. In A Nashville Christmas, Morgan nips at your nose with a jazzy interpretation of the most popular Christmas song of all time, appropriately titled “The Christmas Song.”

Grammy-nominated bluegrass ensemble Dailey & Vincent first garnered worldwide attention with their weekly series The Dailey & Vincent Show on RFD TV, which is currently in production for its second season. In A Nashville Christmas, they sing “The Spirit of Christmas,” immortalized by Ray Charles in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. (Watching it is “a family tradition” Jamie Dailey says.) And their a cappella harmonies on “Silent Night” are a highlight of the evening.

Wynonna also returns with a soulful rendition of “O Holy Night,” introducing the song with powerful words about thankfulness for health and family.

“Momma said we had everything because we had each other,” she says with a smile. “Now that we do have everything, we sit around and talk the most about the times when we had nothing,”

And that’s one of our favorite things about A Nashville Christmas: the sense of history and heritage that infuses every song. For those of us who grew up on classic country on the turntable, in weekly variety shows, or annual holiday specials, A Nashville Christmas is a delightful throwback. It reminds us of a time when this music wasn’t just a genre, it was the soundtrack of our lives.

A Nashville Christmas closes with a group sing-along of “Run Run Rudolph,” a rollicking conclusion to an hour that will have you tapping your toes and drying your eyes. We hope you’ll enjoy this special with loved ones, and share this great music with them as your parents and grandparents may have done in cherished moments past.

For more info, visit the getTV schedule.

To purchase a DVD of A Nashville Christmas, visit Amazon.com.

Merry Christmas!