Levon Helm & The Band With The Crickets - Not Fade Away PLUS Interviews 1996 TNN

Levon Helm & The Band With The Crickets – Not Fade Away PLUS Interviews (1996 TNN Cable). From my Sunday Night Hall of Fame Show tapes and my VHS Buddy Holly collection:
This video begins with the February 1996 introduction of a special “Not Fade Away – Remembering Buddy” on the TNN cable channel. Waylon Jennings was the special host of that original two-night event.

The TNN special had coincided with a Decca label album release and this video also features a collage of some of the artists that also appeared on the TNN special. After the collage it’s on to the title track of the album… “Not Fade Away”. Featuring Levon Helm and The Band along with The Crickets, this became one of my favorite segments of both the LP and the TNN special. At the time of the taping, Sonny Curtis was once again appearing with original Crickets Drummer Jerry Ivan Allison and original Bass player Joe B. Mauldin.

Buddy Holly and the Crickets became one of my favorites in 1957 when I first heard “That’ll Be The Day” on my radio. I started writing, producing and hosting tributes to Buddy, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper as early as 1969 on WEEX - AM 1230 in Easton, Pa. That was the tenth anniversary of the plane crash and coincided with the Coral album release “Buddy Holly - Giant”. At first I called the special tribute show “Three Star Special”, as influenced by a 1959 hit song “The Three Stars” by Tommy Dee. After Don McLean’s dedication of “American Pie” to Buddy, I started calling the show “The Day the Music Died”. My tribute shows continued throughout my broadcast radio career in the Lehigh Valley, PA and Northwest New Jersey area. The last time my five-hour special aired was February 3, 1999 on WODE – Oldies 99.9.

To Recap: This video features segments for the 1996 TV special that first aired on The Nashville Network (TNN) during February 1996. I have restored both the video and audio tracks.

The Sunday Night Hall of Fame Show was broadcast from 1980 to 1992 on WAEB - AM 790 and WKAP – AM 1320. My show returned between 1999 and August 2001 on WODE “ Oldies 99.9”. All stations were located in the Allentown – Bethlehem – Easton, PA area, AKA: The Lehigh Valley.