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The Road to Nashville

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Randall Franks
The Road to Nashville

International Bluegrass Music Museum Legend and America’s Old Time Country Music Hall of Famer Randall Franks , hosts a documentary “Road to Nashville” taped live in Nashville in 2015. Franks returned to his Grand Ole Opry roots on its radio home of Nashville’s WSM to share an appearance on The Allnighter with Marcia Campbell.   / marciacampbellradio   . Franks brought several Share America Scholars to Nashville to tour TV and music businesses and organizations, meet with executives, music legends and learn more about the industry they wish to share their talents within. Among those seen in this video are Grand Ole Opry star Jesse McReynolds (www.jimandjesse.com) and the late Country Music Hall of Famer Mac Wiseman. This performance including Mountain Cove Bluegrass Band of Chattanooga, Tenn. – Cody Harvey, Chris Brown, Eli Beard and Tyler Martelli features several songs including a 2006 bluegrass hit written by Franks and popularized by David Davis and the Warrior River Boys.  Mountain Cove has fostered four Pearl and Floyd Franks Scholars, named for Franks’s late parents, receiving support from the Share America Foundation, Inc. while pursuing their college degrees.(www.mtncovebluegrass.com)

The show also features Share America Scholar Pianist Ryan Stinson of Ringgold, Ga. is a Share America Scholar and he graduated from Luther Rice University with a degree in Religion/Ministry and he lives in Ringgold. He has played piano since the age of 10 and began singing about three years ago. His talents have allowed him to perform on WSM and theaters around the south including special appearances at the Texas Troubadour Theater in Nashville, the Tribute Theater, Country Tonite Theater, and Smoky Mountain Opry Theater in Pigeon Forge, Graceland in Memphis, festivals, concerts and churches. Road to Nashville was directed by Randall Franks with the talents of camera operators Tommy Barnes and Share America scholar Ryan Stinson.

It originally aired at a ticketed event at the Ringgo Theater at the Ringgold Depot in Ringgold, Ga. November 13, 2015 and was submitted to film festivals.

Share America Foundation, Inc., a 501-C-3 of Georgia, fosters the arts and preserves the history of Appalachia through the presentation of the Pearl and Floyd Franks Scholarship to youth who continue traditional music styles of the region. It also hosts special events and creates projects that perpetuate the Appalachian experience. It operates with a five-member volunteer board, currently including Chairman Gary Knowles, Vice Chairman Jimmy Terrell, Secretary James Pelt, President Randall Franks, and Vice President Jerry Robinson, and a task force of volunteers. The organization has assisted 30 college scholars thus far and numerous other youth in aspiring towards their musical goals through entertainer mentors, live performances, and creating opportunities for learning and success. Among the partners of the Share America Foundation are AirPlay Direct, Hillbilly Love, Round Up Grant from the North Georgia Electric Membership Corporation Foundation, Kiwanis Club of Ringgold, and the Wes and Shirley Smith Charitable Endowment and numerous individual donors. “Black Eyed Suzy” & “Filling the River with Tears” (Randall Franks/Peach Picked Pub./BMI) Based on a poem by Evelyn Rose Brock.

To Support Programs Like This Please Donate to the

Share America Foundation, Inc. 

P.O. Box 42, Tunnel Hill, Ga. 30755

To donate to Share America, click here:


Copyright 2015 Randall Franks Media in association with Share America Foundation, Inc.

Mac Wiseman is the focus of new star-studded music release

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One of my favorite people and performers is the talented song stylist a Country Music Hall of Famer Mac Wiseman. I admire his influence on my life so much, I included him in my “Encourager II: Walking with the Masters” book.

He is the focus of a new recording project from Mountain Fever Records featuring a star-studded concept album celebrating his life and spirit.

“I Sang The Song (Life Of The Voice With A Heart)” is now available and it’s first single, “Going Back to Bristol,” featuring the International Bluegrass Music Association’s 2015 Male Vocalist of the Year Shawn Camp, reached #1 back in December.

Bluegrass Hall of Famer Mac Wiseman met with Peter Cooper and Thomm Jutz, sharing intimate details of his 91 years, and of his journey from Virginia boy to American roots music icon. That journey is the subject of I Sang The Song, the joyful and poignant album that springs from Mac’s storytelling sessions.

In liner notes, Cooper writes, “The stories would have been remarkable coming from anyone. But coming from Mac Wiseman, an acknowledged master of American roots music who earned the nickname ‘The Voice with a Heart,’ the stories began to sound like songs. Thomm Jutz and I sat in small chairs that faced the easy chair, situated beneath a photograph of Pleasant Hill Church of the Brethren, Mac’s childhood place of worship. We wrote down the stories, and found them rich with melody and rhyme.”

To begin the recording process, producers Cooper and Jutz assembled an all-star band of musicians including mandolinist Sierra Hull and multi-instrumentalist Justin Moses —both also lent vocal talents—and bassist Mark Fain. Further, featured performers were carefully chosen based not only on artistic mastery, but also reverence for the album’s subject, Mac Wiseman. The result is a collection of perfect performances by John Prine, Jim Lauderdale, Shawn Camp, Junior Sisk, Alison Krauss, Andrea Zonn, Ronnie Bowman, Sonya Isaacs Yeary, Becky Isaacs Bowman, Buddy Melton, and Milan Miller, with special vocal appearances by Mac Wiseman.

“Everyone who sings on this album understands the greatness of Mac Wiseman and the responsibility inherent in voicing Mac’s story and interpreting Mac’s words,” Cooper says. “These artists approached the songs with joyful reverence that is palpable to anyone who listens.”

For more information, visit, www.mountainfever.com.

If you would like to enjoy learning more about Mac Wiseman close up and personal, you can also order his beautifully written book “Mac Wiseman: All My Memories Fit For Print” as told to Walt Trott. The memories reflect nearly a century of the American experience that could only be told through the eyes of someone whose voice found success in so many genres of music.
​Check it out and get your copy on most internet booksellers’ websites. If you are Facebook, like Mac’s Bluegrass ERA, a page on which Mac share video performances and photo memories.