Idina Menzel, Steven Tyler Let It Go at 'CMA Country Christmas' Taping
You can argue till the reindeer come home about when the Christmas season officially starts — with a consensus forming around 6 p.m Thanksgiving night, thanks to encroaching Black Friday opening hours. In Nashville, anyway, it has a very definable start time: 48 hours after the CMA Awards, when the infrastructure that’s already in place at the Bridgestone Arena is used to tape the annual “CMA Country Christmas” special, set for broadcast this year on Dec. 1 on ABC.
We attended the taping, which was, as always, hosted by a holly-jolly Jennifer Nettles. (No word on how Kristian Bush feels about losing his co-host slot since Sugarland entered the solo projects phase of their career.) Some of the usual suspects were missing, like Rascal Flatts and Darius Rucker, the latter of whom finally misses a Country Christmas taping in the year when he has a Christmas album coming out — go figure. But some first-timers appeared in their place, like Alan Jackson, who finally showed up to reprise the self-penned title track of his 2002 album Let It Be Christmas.
Of greatest notes were a couple of star turns from outside the world of country. Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler howled most of the lead vocals in a duet of “Run Run Rudolph” with Brad Paisley, who bled more guitar licks out of the ‘50s rocker than its originator, Chuck Berry, ever have dreamed possible. And Idina Menzel, promoting her new holiday album, proved the night’s MVP and most popular among a certain demographic by dueting with Nettles on “Let It Go” from Frozen as well as soloing on two additional Christmas perennials.
Also in the mix: fresh CMA winners Little Big Town and Brett Eldridge, plus Hunter Hayes, LeAnn Rimes, Sara Evans, Michael W. Smith, Lucy Hale, Nashville TV actress Clare Bowen, and Dan + Shay. (See a full run-down of performers and songs, below.)
Nettles opened the three-and-a-half-hour taping with a rendition of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” sung distinctly in the fashion of the Jackson 5’s “I Want You Back,” with a full phalanx of male backup dancers on hand to indulge in the lost art of 1970s variety-show choreography. Love ‘em or hate ‘em, CMA Country Christmas is just about the only place where these unashamedly old-fashioned hoofers are seen on prime-time anymore… but the dancers never did reappear after this opener. Nettles also closed the show, with a razzle-dazzle “Jingle Bells” and, from her recent solo album, the solemn “This Child,” which is about her own baby’s birth, not the Christ child’s.
Nettles made a joke of forcing Menzel to sing with her, breaking into a snippet of “Do You Want to Build a Snowman” before Menzel “spontaneously” suggested “Let It Go” instead. The Sugarland-stress was surprisingly able to hold her own alongside Menzel on the already-a-classic. Perhaps she’s jonesing to get cast as Galinda in the Wicked movie?
In a bit of only partially scripted patter, Nettles asked Menzel what caused her to want to record a holiday album this year. The Broadway star answered that it was because she wanted to do something to help give the season positive connotations for her 5-year-old son, since her parents “screwed up” her love of the holidays by splitting up on Thanksgiving when she was a kid. “They’re gonna hate that I said that on national television!” she added. The producers asked for a do-over, supposedly on technical grounds, even as you marveled at the unlikelihood of anyone ever getting quite that honest about dysfunctional families on this wholesome a special. On the second try, to her credit, Menzel stuck to her family-messiness grounds, though managing to leave out the “screwed up” this time.
The taping’s off-screen host, radio personality Storme Warren, urged the Bridgestone crowd to practice their standing ovations and think about giving every performer one. But the first singer of the night to get a standing-O that was obviously completely spontaneous was LeAnn Rimes, for the note she held at the end of a tricky arrangement of “Carol of the Bells.”
The night was filled with some of the most powerful or beautiful female voices in country music. Besides Nettles, Rimes, and the non-country outlier Menzel, we also had Underwood and Little Big Town both joining up with Christian music artist Michael W. Smith on selections from his new Christmas album, plus Evans contributing a terrific rock/gospel/Celtic arrangement of “Go Tell It on the Mountain.” If you do not have a spectacular voice, it would have been gutsy to show up and sing amid that kind of company. So… kudos to Lucy Hale and Clare Bowen for having exactly that kind of moxie.
On the guy side, Eldridge and Hayes battled to out-soul each other with their versions of “What Christmas Means to Me” and “Merry Christmas, Baby,” respectively. Naturally, the teaming of Paisley and Tyler proved almost as popular as bringing Menzel into the proceedings, although Brad knew what he was up against. The reaction to “Let It Go” “makes me wish I had little girls instead of little boys,” he said.
Set list (order highly subject to change before the Dec. 1 airdate):
Jennifer Nettles: “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”
Brett Eldridge: “What Christmas Means to Me”
Dan + Shay: “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas”
Alan Jackson: “Winter Wonderland,” “Let It Be Christmas”
Idina Menzel: “Do You Hear What I Hear”
Little Big Town: “I Pray on Christmas”
LeAnn Rimes: “Carol of the Bells”
Nettles and Menzel: “Let It Go”
Michael W. Smith and Carrie Underwood: “All is Well”
Hunter Hayes: “Merry Christmas Baby”
Sara Evans: “Go Tell It on the Mountain”
Steven Tyler and Brad Paisley: “Run Run Rudolph”
Lucy Hale: “Mistletoe”
Rimes: “Someday at Christmas”
Smith and Little Big Town: “Silent Night”
Menzel: “White Christmas”
Clare Bowen: “Santa Baby”
Nettles: “This Angel,” “Jingle Bells”
