SEVIERVILLE - Guitarist Pat Corn of Sevierville, Tennessee grew up on the stage of the Grand Ol’ Opry and remembers advising Buck Trent on his first night on the Opry–(Porter Wagoner’s banjo player)…“Don’t be nervous. It’s no big deal.” Corn may have a bit of his own jitters now as he launches his own business, “New Classic Country Records.”

Designed to take advantage of new media marketing techniques, New Classic Country Records will work with iTunes and other popular music vendors to release individual songs and will offer full album sales online. His motto? “Putting country and western music back into the hearts and hands of the people.”

Pat Corn

On February 20, 2010 he and a business partner are launching a web site for the business. They have plans for releasing music to a European audience as well as the Unites States. Corn believes that the time has come for classic country music to make a comeback into the global marketplace, although for many people the love for it never went away.

“I have attended events where they played what is sometimes called New Country music, and had people around me asking ‘But when are they going to play the COUNTRY music? We want some Merle!’ and I knew exactly what they meant,” Corn says.

That got him thinking and eventually the idea for his own music company evolved. His already rich background in the music business provided an excellent foundation.

Born in Hendersonville, NC, Pat became consumed with being a guitar player at an early age. His father made him his first guitar, at the age of 3, from a Prince Albert cigar box, a broom handle for a neck, fishing line for strings, and a piece of endless belt for a strap. Each day spent in front of the TV watching The Arthur Smith Show, broadcasted from Charlotte, NC, only fueled that dream to be a guitar player one day. As a teenager Pat began to play professionally at 14 years of age, and by the age of 19 had already recorded his guitar work on five #1 hits with major artists in the R&B/ Pop fields.

Today, Pat can be found regularly each Sunday morning at the Country Tonite Theater in Pigeon Forge, where he is the host and musical director for the Smoky Mountain Cowboy Church (SMCC). The SMCC live musical outreach broadcast reaches over 250 million listeners around the world each week through it’s combined radio partners which includes WSM AM-650 Online (The Grand Ole Opry station) clear channel broadcasting from Nashville, XM Satellite Radio, and WWCR (Worldwide Country Radio) broadcasting around the world.

Corn said he is also planning to develop tours and local live performances for the talent he will feature through New Classic Country Records.

“I can see us promoting shows for as low as $15 a ticket,” Corn said. “That will make this music affordable for the people who really want to hear it. We’ll go to high school gyms and places like that to make it really accessible for the people.”

More information can be found at the new website address after the February 20 launch: www.newclassiccountry.com or  www.myspace.com/newclassiccountryrecords

–Laura Long Martin/SevierCountyNews.com