Opening night of Music City Roots: Live From The Loveless would be historic if only for the inauguration of the first all-new live radio show on Nashville’s WSM-AM in a half century. But this gala performance will also bring together the voices of three women who have history of their own.

Emmylou Harris, a recent inductee to the Country Music Hall of Fame, may be the most famous name, but look into her storied career and the names Kennedy and Rose pop up again and again as her collaborators in touring and performing.

Mary Ann Kennedy and Pam Rose are performing songwriters who have enjoyed success together and separately. Their hits as co-writers include Martina McBride’s “Safe In The Arms Of Love” and “I’ll Still Be Loving You,” recorded by Restless Heart, which earned Kennedy and Rose one of their two song-of-the-year Grammy nominations. And around 1990, their duo albums marked a rootsy female counterpart to acts like Foster and Lloyd and The O’Kanes.

In the 1990s, Kennedy and Rose toured on Sting’s Soul Cages tour and Emmylou Harris’s Ballad of Sally Rose tour, plus special dates supporting Harris at Bill Clinton’s inaugural and the 1997 Nobel Peace Price Ceremony in Norway. As recently as 2008, Kennedy and Rose toured with Harris in Europe, where American roots music has historically enjoyed a very warm welcome.

For her part, Harris is Nashville’s graceful and modest icon of Americana music, whose improbable career has drawn new lines between folk, country and rock. She has one of the most memorable voices of the past fifty years and an unfailing ear for great songs. She lent that voice to some of the turning points in modern roots music, including the Band’s Last Waltz concert film and the soundtrack of O Brother, Where Art Thou? Her early 90s At The Ryman live album proved partly responsible for inspiring the renovation and re-opening of the Mother Church of Country Music.

We could go on and on. But we won’t. Come enjoy an intimate evening with some excruciatingly talented girlfriends as Music City Roots stakes its claim as Nashville’s world-wide showcase for Americana music. Rounding out the evening will be more female talent. Emerging artists Robin Aigner and Annie Crane hail from New York, where they are carrying on Harris’s tradition of refashioning folk music in a modernist and urbane guise.

“The show is the most exciting thing I've heard of in this town for quite some time”, says Pam Rose. “Real radio for real music.”

-- Craig Havighurst