CMT Blog: Charity

I've recently discovered the Celebrity Experiences up for auction at CharityBuzz.com. If you win one of these pricey-but-awesome hangs with stars, the money goes to a variety of notable causes like Habitat for Humanity, American Red Cross, Songwriters Hall of Fame, Susan G. Komen Foundation and other worthy non-profits. So if you work out with Hugh Jackman or hang with Alec Baldwin on the set of 30 Rock or get a walk-on role in HBO's Entourage, for instance, your cold hard cash would do a lot of good. But as priceless as those celebs are, I can think of a few Celebrity Experiences that would be worth even more. Maybe you could have a major role in the next Taylor Swift video. Or play Miranda Lambert's stylist for a day. Or sing a duet live with Lady Antebellum at a concert near you. Or go on a yoga/mani-pedi/Starbucks run with Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman. They did just have a Zac Brown Band "Eat & Greet" that gave you the chance to have lunch with the band before their show and get VIP seats, with the proceeds of that going to Urban Farming whose mission is to eradicate hunger, alleviate poverty and green our environment. More of that would be nice.

If you caught Jimmy Buffett and Friends: Live From the Gulf Coast when it aired Sunday night (July 11) on CMT, then you had to have noticed the huge crowd that turned out for the free show in Gulf Shores, Ala. I don't know the exact number, but it looked like attendance came pretty close to the 35,000 mark that organizers were expecting. That's a great thing for the people and businesses of the Gulf Coast area and, at the very least, shows one thing to local officials: People still want to head to the beach -- especially if you give them a special reason. To that end, it looks like Buffett's show may only be the first in a series of free concerts held on the Alabama coast. According to The Associated Press, there's a $15 million tourism grant from BP that could be used to put on more shows. Promoters are already pointing toward Faith Hill and Zac Brown Band (who had to miss the Buffett show due to a scheduling conflict) as possible performers, as well as Hawaiian beach rocker Jack Johnson. What do you think? Who would you want to see? And how much would it help the area?

Photo credit: Rick Diamond/Getty Images

Jimmy Wayne has less than 200 miles remaining on his Nashville-to-Phoenix trek to raise awareness for the Meet Me Halfway campaign. He's been walking with his belongings on his back since Jan. 1, nearly every day, and hopes to reach the end of this journey by July 31. Wayne was motivated to do this because he was a homeless teenager for a while, so he wants people to see just how rough it is out there and to inspire families to help teens who need homes. And it seems like his celebrity status is already shining a light on the problem. "I just got two letters last night and one a few minutes ago from families who have been inspired by this walk. One family went out and adopted three teens. I just told them that is enough for me to know that this walk was so worth it. Those kids' lives are changed. Their lives are now on a different track," he said. "You never know what's going to happen when you start doing something this radical, and somewhere along the line, people have helped keep this thing in the right lane."

It's a pleasure doing business with Tim McGraw and Faith Hill. Now that the $2.2 million in ticket sales were all added up, the proceeds can be donated to the Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee to help flood victims still trying to overcome the tragedy that hit back in May. (You can make that number even higher by grabbing some post-concert merch like T-shirts and posters.) So the Nashville Rising: A Benefit Concert for Flood Recovery show was more than just a fun night full of country's best and brightest stars, including Jason Aldean, Toby Keith, Miranda Lambert and Taylor Swift. It was a no-brainer way for celebs and fans to make sure Music City gets back on its feet. "We cannot thank Faith Hill and Tim McGraw enough for stepping up and marshalling the gifts of all who were both onstage and back stage during this once-in-a lifetime event," said Ellen Lehman, the head of the organization.

Photo credit: Fred Breedon/Getty Images

Julianne Hough was at last week's ACM Lifting Lives Music Camp to help lift the spirits of everyone and sing a little karaoke with the campers who have Williams Syndrome. That's a genetic condition that comes with a long list of cardiovascular and developmental issues, but it also can result in a very social personality and an affinity for music. Hough said herself, after singing "Lean on Me" with camper Clancey Hopper, that these young adults were so gifted and so talented. "Their energy and their positivity is so beyond," she says in the clip from her day there. "I'm gonna leave here floating."

There was a time when Miranda Lambert had stage fright? I find that hard to believe, now that she totally owns the stage every time she performs. Apparently she credits two of her East Texas teachers with helping her conquer that fear. Janice Caldwell and April Coker were chosen by Lambert to be part of the "Teachers Count" campaign, the one that says "Behind Every Famous Person Is a Fabulous Teacher." The two instructors flew to Nashville recently for the photo shoot for the campaign posters and also attended the Nashville Rising concert. (Caldwell even got a hug from Reba McEntire, which she promptly posted on her Facebook page.) Lambert must've been a little bit of a challenge as a student, because Caldwell said, "I helped her not quit school and April helped her graduate from school." Coker added that it feels special to be remembered this way, saying, "When you work so hard all these years and you have somebody that is so successful, but then they remember your efforts for them, to help them, then it just hits you in the heart."

Nashville, here's the good news in your neck of the woods. Weatherman Al Roker, of NBC's Today show, gave the charity Hands On Nashville a much-needed boost for their flood relief efforts yesterday (June 24). His Lend A Hand charitable project donated thousands of dollars worth of things like carpet, mattresses, paint, furniture and clothing needed to rebuild the roughly 11,000 homes that were affected by the devastating floods in May. Dierks Bentley was also in the Bellevue neighborhood for the presentation (and a quick acoustic performance of "Love Goes Wild" with fiddler Jason Carter and Jon Randall on mandolin) after the donations were revealed. Hands On Nashville dispersed more than 17,000 volunteers right after the flood in early May and with this donation, their hands will keep rebuilding even more homes.

Just when you thought you knew everything about a country music artist, you find out something you didn't know. For example, Rascal Flatts' Jay DeMarcus and Gary LeVox have been personally affected by suicide following their uncle's death in 2001. Joe Don Rooney lost a friend to suicide in high school as well. That's why it was so important for the band to create awareness about suicide prevention and why they've teamed up with The Jason Foundation's "B1" project. Its mission is to help young people recognize the signs that someone might be thinking about suicide. The band's sad, sad piano ballad, "Why," is about the suicide of a 17-year-old singer, and asks, "Was there anything I could've said or done?" The lyrics also say, "I had no clue you were masking a troubled soul/God only knows what went wrong/And why you would leave the stage in the middle of a song." Speaking on behalf of the organization, LeVox explains, "Our youth need to know they have options and there are people that want to help them."

The New York Times' review of the Nashville Rising benefit from Tuesday night (June 22) is in and it's an outstanding recap of an outstanding concert. But what I like best is the writer's insightful look at Martina McBride's performance of "Anyway." It's a song that she co-wrote with Brett and Brad Warren about overcoming hurdles, about chasing dreams that seem so out of reach, and how you sing, pray, build, do, believe and love despite the fact that sometimes life (and floods) gets in the way. The story says, "Martina McBride, one of country's most elegant singers, received one of the night's loudest responses to the opening lines of 'Anyway': 'You can spend your whole life building/Something from nothing/One storm can come and blow it all away/Build it anyway.'" I can imagine how moving that must've been.

Tonight (June 22) is Tim McGraw and Faith Hill's Nashville Rising benefit concert for flood relief. I'm not able to go, but I love reading about the good they are still doing for all the victims, like hoping to raise up to $3 million for the Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee in just one night. In this story from the Tennessean, Hill says one of the reasons why they put this show together for June, nearly eight weeks after the flood hit, is because people will continue to need help down the road. "You need it all. You need the beginning, the middle and the end," she said. McGraw agreed, saying "Everybody was putting their benefits together (immediately following the flood), and that was fantastic and they raised a lot of money. But ... we knew that later on down the line it would start losing some wind." I'm happy that McGraw and Hill are keeping the local devastation top of mind long after most of the national attention has died down.

Photo credit: Jason Merritt/Getty Images