Music Continues to Take Center Stage on ‘Nashville’ Season 5
Any fan of Nashville knows the music is a driving force of the show. That fact hasn't changed for Season 5 of the nighttime drama, which aired its season premiere Jan. 5 on its new home on CMT after it was canceled by its original network, ABC.
Clare Bowen, the blue-eyed beauty who plays Scarlett O’Connor, tells Taste of Country during an on-set interview that she believes the show has found its ideal match in the new network.
"CMT, I think, is the perfect home for us because they're local and they get it — they're all about music,” she says. As for how her character’s “metamorphosis” is reflected in the music this season, Bowen reveals that personal elements of someone’s life always manage to come out in a song.
“So I think that's something that I have yet to discover in Season 5, that Scarlett is singing about what she's feeling now as this new creature who actually, I'm hoping, discovers that she is a precious creature and deserves to be loved properly," the actress says. “So I think there's even more of a connection than there ever was between the stories and the music."
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Charles Esten, the actor behind fan favorite Deacon Claybourne, reveals that the music in Season 5 surrounding his storyline relates more to his wife Rayna (Connie Britton) and her struggles as an artist.
“Music always drives the show, I mean it's always right there in the scene,” he says. “And for this year, I think a lot of it starts with Rayna wanting to rediscover who she is as an artist and as a musician, as a singer, as a performer because she's had her irons in so many other fires."
Chris Carmack, who portrays the strong, yet conflicted country singer Will Lexington, sees a deep connection between the music, the show and its fans, describing it as a powerful storytelling method. “In many ways, these songs are about the conception of the song, about the creation of the song and about what part of someone's life went into these lyrics," he says. “It's an even stronger storytelling element and it draws our audience in, I think, on a level that I haven't seen done on other television shows."
Fans can continue to hear the amazing music of Nashville every Thursday night at 9PM EST on CMT.
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