Column's congratulations to JOHNNY COUNTERFIT, cast as an announcer introducing LORETTA LYNN  (played by JESSIE MUELLER ) in the forthcoming flick, Patsy & Loretta, premiering  October 19, 2018 at 8 p.m. Eastern Time on Lifetime.

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October, 2019's email contains JEREMY WESTBY's invitation to attend the OAK RIDGE BOYS October 4, 2019 news conference in Tulsa as the quartet unveils a public service announcement; part of a social media campaign calling attention to attempts to defraud the elderly, while BEV MOSER has requested my backstage presence at the annual DOTTIE WEST (posthumous) birthday bash (benefiting the Nashville Musicians' Association's Musician Emergency Relief Fund), this year on October 9th at 3rd and Lindsley.

Since this year the West birthday bash honored BILL ANDERSON, it was only fitting that Bill's musical legacy be acknowledged.  Anderson, still  actively performing less than a month before his 82nd birthday, was perfectly capable of performing- and did perform- his own songs but Bill watched in appreciation as TIM ATWOOD treated the crowd to his version of the Anderson-penned, VINCE GILL hit, Which Bridge to Cross (Which Bridge to Burn).

Before the show, Tim told me that his fourth album It Matters To Me is about to be released.

Also during the time set aside for backstage interviews prior to show time at the West tribute, after receiving a hug from the multi talented PETER COOPER (another of the evening's performers) I spotted JIMMY CAPPS.

I told Jimmy how much I enjoyed reading his recently-published autobiography  (ghosted by SCOT ENGLAND) and Capps told me that he had known Dottie since she sang in a house band long before West became a star.  That memory was not Jimmy's favorite.  As he put it:  "If you read my book then you know my favorite Dottie West memory."

This is true.  Capps, noting that he played on "all of Dottie's duets with KENNY ROGERS and on all of her solo albums," backed up all of the stars in this West birthday bash tribute lineup, including his wife, MICHELLE. 

During yet another pre-show interview, Dottie's granddaughter, TESS FRIZZELL (ALLEN FRIZZELL's and SHELLY WEST's daughter),  gave me the scoop that she would be singing her grandmother's sassy hit, Lesson in Leavin'  with Dottie's original backup singers, NANETTE BOHANNON and VICKIE CARRICO.

Tess' favorite memory of her grandmother was not the photo I took of the two backstage at the Grand Ole Opry a week before Dottie was tragically killed in a wreck en route to the Opry (she'd never seen the unpublished photo), but of Tess' first national TV appearance.

Ironically, millions will remember the event, but, strictly speaking, not Tess, a native Nashvillian, who was only a day old at the time.  For Shelly having not yet given birth when Dottie left for Los Angeles to host the 1982 Academy of Country Music Awards.

That meant Dottie's first glimpse of her granddaughter came when a videotape of Shelly holding Tess to the camera from a hospital bed was rushed so that Tess' national network TV debut, and resulting emotional surprise for her first-time grandmother, was available by airtime to be incorporated into the "live" ACM Awards show!

After I spoke briefly with birthday bash sponsor GUS ARRENDALE,  about the joy that he receives from traditional country music and helping the Musicians' Fund (joking with him about Vice-President MIKE PENCE's touring Tyson Foods' Nashville processing plant a couple of days earlier), the Springer Mountain Farm president was clearly dreaming big when I suggested that next visit Springer Mountain Farm's headquarters. 

His response?  "Yes, or even President Trump!"  (BTW, Gus, thanks for the unsolicited gift of high-dollar Springer Mountain Farm coupons.)

Arrendale's company's three-year West birthday tribute sponsorship is equaled only by JEANNIE SEELY's three-year tenure as host of the show.  In fact,  Dottie's birthday tribute show exists because of Seely's effort to honor her friend in that manner, not to Jeannie and RON HARMON's tireless campaign to right a wrong that ended only when West was finally inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.

Jeannie stressed that, unlike the Grand Ole Opry Trust Fund (of which she is also a tireless supporter) and MusiCares, the Musicians' Fund enables a musician in need to receive a check "right now."  She adds that people should realize that even if a musician becomes sick with the flu,  which could be, as it is with non musicians,  a pretty common occurrence, "it could mean the end of a tour." 

Seely added that apart from sporadic individual donations and the union itself, proceeds from Dottie's birthday bash keep the musicians' fund afloat as its primary source of income: "There's no other outside funding of this magnitude."

During the show, Jeannie performed, sang background and led the crowd in singing Happy Birthday to Dottie.  Egos, to a large extent, were checked at the door.   KELLY LANG cheered T.G. SHEPPARD on as he summed up the evening's vibe, singing his hit, Party Time with RUDY GATLIN (one of the evening's auctioneers) singing backup, while JOHN RANDALL (who sang Whiskey Lullaby) took a turn backing Peter Cooper's performance of 3 A.M.

Why even BUDDY CANNON and his wife, MELANIE sang backup for JAMEY JOHNSON.

Surprises included MO PITNEY's filmed tribute to Bill Anderson and and performances by JOHN SCHNEIDER and STEVE DORFF.

DAVE POMEROY noted that the Musicians' Emergency Fund is able to make individual grants for up to $2,500 and, thanks to the collectively generous funding, the "third largest union in the United States, despite Tennessee being a right-to-work state" has distributed more than $409,000.

The auctioning of three celebrity-signed guitars and posters, along with the evening's ticket sales, have already added $28,000 to the emergency fund's coffers with, according to Bev Moser, an "exact amount still being counted as last minute donations came in."

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Reaction to KEN BURNS' Country Music has resulted in a spike in music sales of several of the artists featured in the documentary and an anticipation of a boost in tourism by those who are attuned to such possibilities, coinciding with the September 2019 publication of  Country Music: An Illustrated History.

No doubt Nashvillians who were in agreement with the tax incentives provided Florentine Films feel vindicated; that Music City has and will continue to receive its money's worth- and more.

The May 23, 2016 announcement of the funding, in an unspecified amount, resulted in my publicly-stated opposition to the move, given that these incentives were "proposed after Burns committed to produce a country music documentary."

In a Letter to the Editor a tennessean.com copy editor chose to title Burns should seek balance for documentary, I went on to write "It is impossible to cover country music's history without covering the tax-exempt lobbying organizations that have shaped it- and not always for the better. 

"Burns can't do that unless he is directed to knowledgeable sources, which would be counterproductive to the desires of not only the mayor's office and Nashville Chamber of Commerce, but, more importantly, to the Country Music Association and the Country Music Hall of Fame...

"Word is Burns is already being led by the nose as he navigates what, for him, are uncharted waters.  He's not receiving production incentives without the expectation of further control over the project."

I suggested that Ken Burns and his production team "will retain their integrity and resist such temptations if they understand the manipulation and actively seek out voices to balance the agenda-driven recommendations they assume they're receiving in good faith."

At the time I wrote those words I was the same big Ken Burns fan I remain today and was frustrated by my inability to obtain direct contact information to inform Burns (or someone else involved in the production) of same, as well as my interest in serving as one of the series' advisers given the knowledge I've accumulated over my five decades of observation and involvement; my tenure as the "Doyenne of Music Row."

When I heard that interviews for the series had begun, I latched on to a couple of names and, on September 26, 2017 I sent a generic email with the names KATY HAAS and CHRISTOPHER DARLING in the subject line, sent to their attention requesting corresponding email addresses. Receiving no response, but not sensing time constraints, having heard no more about the project from anyone, I waited awhile before asking an industry colleague, whose interview had just been filmed, for a better email address for Haas, with whom she had worked. (Any footage obtained was ultimately not used and- unless I missed it- as the credits rolled each time over successive installments of the series, my associate never received any credit; an omission not remedied in the acknowledgments nor index found in Country Music: An Illustrated History - the hardcover book based on the series).

Once the industry veteran gave me Katy's direct email address I used it to contact the series' associate producer on September 4, 2018.

Having yet to received a response to that email, on September 26, 2018 I reluctantly used another generic email address.   It was at that point that I first heard of DAYTON DUNCAN- the person whom I should have contacted all along!

Dayton (as my fellow native Midwesterner prefers to be addressed) was responsive from my first contact.  Unfortunately, by the time I was able to reach him, in February, 2019, Duncan informed me that production had concluded.

But Dayton saw the value in copying JOE DePLASCO, "which has handled the promotion of our films... He can provide you with a fuller description of the film."

Maybe so, but DePlasco chose not to, so I was glad when Dayton gave me permission to quote him as we continued our email correspondence in advance of the country-music series airing. 

Anticipating the criticism that come from those who were not aware of the writer's (and production company's) self-imposed limitations on the scope of the documentary, Dayton clarified that the series was "eight episodes. 16 and a half hours in length and it covers the history of the music from its roots to the late 1990s.

"We're historians and not journalists, so for a series like this (as with Jazz, Baseball, and even National Parks) we need to have a better feel between what might seem popular and important in moment, versus what emerges as the important milestones over time.

"Ours is a story-telling narrative, not an encyclopedic list of names and songs, and our series is our best collective effort at telling the history of a uniquely American art form that itself tells stories through songs; and we try to focus as much as possible on the lives of people who made the music, and give some breathing room as well for the songs themselves (and sometimes the stories behind those songs.

"We fully realize that others might make different choices, and we fully anticipate that some folks will have complaints about what's not there (probably more than what's there).

"With passage of time, maybe Florentine will return to [the] topic (we did that with Baseball, not in any others),but there's plenty of opportunity for someone else to bring things into the the 21st century as well."

With male-dominated program advisers beginning with the buddy-buddy "Oermax twins," not to mention BILL IVEY and PAUL KINGBURY, it became obvious why the otherwise unaware Burns crew (like most "outsiders" who approach the familiar 501s, admittedly the seemingly logical place to start), relied on those they did, to the exclusion of people and source material that would have otherwise been available.  (These industry-directed detours are by design.)

And while that is disappointing (industry bullies continue to be emboldened), I will be the first one to say that I thought the result was so good that once the series concluded, as with past Florentine productions, I was the closest I'll ever be to a drug addict forced to go cold turkey.

So what might have been different had STACY HARRIS been consulted?  

Well, a promotional reel referencing The Singing Brakeman (to whom Ken Burns referred as Burns was being interviewed by JEFF GLOR on the September 14, 2019 edition of CBS This Morning Saturday) might have shown him rather than the Honeycomb singer.

I refer to my notes on the series, beginning with the first episode (OAD September 15, 2019). 

During the opening sequence, in which KATHY MATTEA reminisces about her time as a Country Music Hall of Fame tour guide, a photo of FRANK JONES (my ex- GARY's dad)  and DOROTHY RITTER appears.  I appreciate that there wasn't time to identify either by explanation, but a photo caption might have at least sent the curious to Google.

My reaction was the same when clearly identifiable images of an otherwise unidentified ROD BRASFIELD appeared in separate episodes of the series.

My wish list would have included some mention of our industry's characters, ranging from JERRY SEABOLT to HENRIETTA DARR-JOHNSON, but, here again, the episodes had to have continuity and conform, to some extent, to viewers' attention spans.  

I was curious about the inclusion of BETTY JOHNSON, especially since Betty demonstrated that she didn't know the words to I'll Fly Away...

And why was DAVID COBB, who was referenced, not identified by name?

By Episode Four viewers learn that PATSY CLINE appeared on a Washington, D.C. TV show, but why wasn't the show's host, JIMMY DEAN identified by name?  Additionally, I imagine that any description of Cline's famous cigarette lighter  (found at the scene of her storied death, chronicled by Burns and Duncan) would have ignited- no pun intended- yet another discussion that music historians under time constraints might dismiss as a digression.

And, why within the context of the previously oft-told story of WILLIE NELSON's Family Bible was CLAUDE GRAY not identified by name?

Amid detailing of the founding of the Country Music Association, viewers should have been introduced to JO WALKER (rather than JO WALKER MEADOR  as Mrs. CHARLES WALKER, as she was known during the time of the narrative, later became), the documentary's depiction of the organization's first and only member made it appear that Jo's ascendancy was an industry nod to feminism that would have, historically, been ahead of its time.

The truth was exactly the opposite.  As I wrote in my 1998 CMA chronology The Country Music Association: What Is It Afraid Of?, "CMA Executive Director HARRY STONE, who had assumed his position in February, 1959, left his post later that year, most likely due to a combination of ill health and the fact that the cash-poor CMA couldn't afford to pay both his salary and Jo Walker's.

"Funds were so scarce that, during at least one board meeting, the hat was passed in order to pay Walker, who, after Stone left, assumed the executive director's responsibilities for some time before she ever received the job title."

Some random thoughts: Where was some sort of context, or otherwise an explanation of, color home movies of LORETTA LYNN at a time when the lower middle-class, of which the singer was then a member, could not afford pricey movie cameras and the expensive color film that was  part of the equation?

And why was there no effort to identify BILL ANDERSON'S "wife of a dear friend" (and her spouse)? 

I was pleased that by Episode 5 an early identification of BUD WENDELL as the (insurance) salesman that he once was, was updated to reflect the reasons why the Grand Ole Opry's parent company eventually named a building after him. 

A rare factual error about ROY ACUFF occurred in that same episode: "When Acuff was in his mid-60s," it was said, his days of having "big hits were behind him." 

While an anomaly, Back in the Country peaked at #5 in Billboard on April 6, 1974, only slightly more than five months before the King of Country Music's 71st birthday.  

Surprisingly, Burns documentaries' requisite narrator, veteran actor PETER COYOTE (whose dulcet tones remind me of HENRY FONDA) had a penchant throughout the country-music documentary for mispronouncing the given middle name (and stage surname) of the First Lady of Country Music during episodes six and seven.  That's understandable given that it's the same mistake made by, among the proverbial "many others",  a former First Lady of the United States who famously apologized to TAMMY WYNETTE (but, like Coyote, not for her mispronunciation of the phonetically-correct Winnett as Why-net.) 

Episode six also referenced EUPLE BYRD, but not by name.  Any husband of Tammy Wynette's worth referencing is worth being identifying by name.  Historians need to take the time.

The mention of Wynette's alleged "kidnapping " should have opened up a can of worms.  As someone who was in Green Hills at the time, and close to the scene of the alleged attack, I can affirm that the police were not interested in what I had to say about the incident at the time and it stands to reason that anyone with knowledge of the facts was also dismissed in favor of the more convenient explanation (which wasn't really cited in segment seven either).

A decade or so ago, JOHNNY CASH's niece/office manager, KELLY HANCOCK told me that Cash's erstwhile ABC series would likely never air on 21st century televisions since getting clearances would be a bureaucratic nightmare; Sadly, many of the guest stars had passed by that point, which would mean dealing with their estates, not to mention company mergers and takeovers which produce other rights issues.

That's why I was surprised when GET TV added the Cash show to its Sunday night nostalgia lineup a couple of years ago.  But then it's clear that GET doesn't own (or is otherwise not exercising its right to licensing rights of) the entire series, because it keeps airing, and re-airing, the same handful of episodes.  Enter Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan, whose country-music documentary featured excerpts from the Cash show that apparently had not aired since the original air dates.  

And when detailing Columbia Records' (chief RICK BLACKBURN's) decision not to renew Cash's recording contract (displaying BOB OERMANN's headline worldwide exclusive detailing same), an opportunity was missed to tell the story of how only an intervention by Oermann's boss, JOHN SEIGENTHALER (and a forced apology from Oermann for violating basic journalistic principles), along with considerable ego massaging, convinced a furious and self-described ambushed Blackburn and an equally angry, embarrassed and humiliated Man in Black to cease pressure they were piling on Seig to fire his entertainment writer.

Burns' team did not mention, if it knew, the questionable, if not downright sordid, country music-related history of the Evangel Temple,which Coyote referenced by way of touching on JIMMIE SNOW. 

A mention that Hee Haw spent three years of its quarter-century run on CBS deserved some context, beginning with the fact that the show was inspired by the success of NBC's Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In. 

It was interesting to see JAN HOWARD's shocking comments in the aftermath of her son JIMMY's death reprised in Burns' country-music documentary (a sequence that first aired in The Viet Nam War), but in the portion of the interview reserved for the PBS country-music documentary, Jimmy's brothers, CORKY and DAVID, who were referenced should not have gone unnamed.

Episode seven touched on the dissension within the country-music community caused by the Country Music Association bestowing its honors on  OLIVIA NEWTON JOHN's (Female Vocalist of the Year)  and JOHN DENVER' s (Entertainer of the Year) without even a mention of the Association of Country Entertainers (ACE) that formed as a result, to say nothing of the story behind ACE's subsequent dissolution. 

HAZEL SMITH's being identified as a "journalist" and presumed authority figure was interesting in light of Smith's glaring grammatical lapses, to say nothing of her mispronunciation of SHEL SILVERSTEIN's surname. 

The doc gets high marks for its explanation of TOMPALL GLASER's contribution to country's music first platinum-selling album, but there was no mention of his status as the lead singer of the highly-successful country-music trio, TOMPALL and the GLASER BROTHERS.

Kudos to Dayton and Ken for omitting the "goat story"from their JOHNNY RODRIGUEZ segment, thus not further propagating (the myth of) an event that never happened).

Episode eight marked the conclusion of the most ambitious project of its kind, to date, but not without a bit of hyperbole that seemed credible (unless examined) if only because of how well, overall, each episode of the presentation delivered what it promised.  I refer to the "over the top" presumption of the assertion, presented as fact, that REBA McENTIRE "would come to speak for women everywhere."

I hope Messrs. Burns and Duncan will return to Nashville and not so much update what they've done as focus on the history of the country-music business, the end of handshake agreements, the demise of country-music's print media, the endless abuses of power, the abandonment of Music Row as the industry's business district, the fizzling of #MeToo as quickly as it surfaced (despite some historically significant, pre-Internet disclosures dating back decades that were dismissed because they were ahead of their time),  etc.