About The Show

Country Gold is a study of vintage country music between WWII and Watergate, seen through today’s perspective on Southern culture. It is designed for public radio audiences.

WNCW, the public music station from the mountains of North Carolina, has aired the show since 2013. It began as a two-hour show. It was then extended to three hours in response to the public’s demand and extremely high ratings.

The show is structured in six segments with each hour totaling 58 minutes and a break roughly every half hour.

The first segment is what would most nearly resemble a regular country music show. The music can feature birthdays and recent deaths, but mostly it is a free form exploration of vintage country music.

The second segment presents rebroadcasts of iconic radio shows: Grand Ole Opry segments, Louisiana Hayride segments, Hank Williams radio shows, (such as Health and Happiness Shows, Mother’s Best Flour shows, Garden Spot shows) or 15-minute recruitment shows for the US Army, Navy and Air Force.

The third and fourth segments combine to form Theme Time. During this hour Tom selects a theme and everyone journeys to wherever the music takes us. Some themes explored so far this year include Togetherness, June Brides and Weddings, Fire, Sleep, Pain and Divorce. Of course major holidays become themes as well as some lesser ones, like April Fool’s Day, Mardi Gras and Mother’s Day, and Father’s Day. Tom masters this form of thematic radio programming due to his 19 years of work at KUT in Austin, TX where that was the norm at the time.

The fifth segment- some may say the unique- is the most ambitious of all. It is Billboard’s Top 10 C&W Hits for the show date on one of the years during the 50s and 60s with commentary on the songs. (The actual date is not announced in case the show is delayed or rebroadcast.) Few have the resources to even try such a segment. Tom is well equipped with the entire top 100 chart hits for all of the years between 1945 and 1975 as well as over 120 Bear Family box sets in addition to dozens of box sets from other companies.

The sixth and final segment is devoted to contemporary artists who perform in a classic country style.

Some stations opt for two hours while others opt for the full three hours. The two-hour version includes the following segments in the following order: 1, 5, 3, 4. Some stations don’t have 3-hour slots to fill, while others do. Some, like WNCW, will start with two and then increase to three due to popular demand.

To preview our 2 or 3 hour shows and their segments, please visit the Audio Clips page.

tom pittman 2.jpg — About Tom Pittman

Tom Pittman was born in Charleston, SC, and was raised mostly in Augusta, GA. After graduating from the University of Georgia, he lived in Asheville, NC, for four years. It was there that he acquired his first pedal steel guitar. He moved to Austin, TX, in 1974 and co-founded the band the Austin Lounge Lizards In 1980. He performed with the Lizards for 31 years, touring in 40 states, four Canadian Provinces, and all around the UK. In 1993 he began DJ work at KUT Austin, hosting a folk program. Two years later he began hosting a Bluegrass program on KOOP Austin. He continued all three of these enterprises until he returned to Asheville in 2011. He began to do fill in work on WNCW that year and eventually came to host the Sunday morning fan favorites, The Gospel Truth and Country Gold. His show was syndicated to WSDL in Salisbury, MD, for 4 years until a station-wide format change.

Endorsements

“As the program director at WNCW, I have had the pleasure to work with Tom Pittman for many years.

Tom took his Country Gold show concept and made it a winner here, growing his audience to the point where it is one of the largest we have for any of our programs. It helps lead the way with our fundraising, and it has been in an especially high gear as far as member donations in recent years, with previous fundraising records broken over and over. Quite simply, it is one of the biggest hit shows that WNCW has ever had.”

— Joe Kendrick - Director of Programming and operations, WNCW

“Tom Pittman’s Country Gold show is always a great listen. He plays the best in country music- some old, some new, all of it true. It’s hard to find the real thing and this is it.”

— Tim O’Brien, Grammy winning singer, songwriter & instrumentalist

“Tom Pittman is the real deal. His breadth and depth of knowledge about vintage country music is fantastic and he delivers the goods in a warm and friendly manner. The mark of a good music program is making the subject interesting even to a newcomer or someone who may not be initially in the genre, and keeping them hooked. Tom Pittman’s Country Gold is that program.

In the four years that we carried his show it was always delivered in a timely manner, ready to air.”

— Chris Ranck - WSCL 89.5 FM, WSDL 90.7 FM, WESM 91.3

“I’m a big fan of WNCW. I listen all the time whether I’m in North Carolina or home. And I Love your Sunday show…Country Gold. I love that show. I listen to it every Sunday.”

— Steve Martin, from an on-air interview on WNCW

“Tom Pittman has been a fellow traveler down the Hillbilly Highway for over 3 decades. As a listener, I have followed him from the Austin Music scene, to the hills of North Carolina. His depth of knowledge of the music, and his warm, welcoming delivery are everything I want in a host. He takes the listener with him every show through a well-thought-out playlist that is always just right. He loves this music and his audience, and it shows every time he cracks the mic.”

— Dallas Wayne - SiriusXM, Willie’s Roadhouse, The Outlaw Channel

“Whenever my wife and I are in town, we look forward to listening to Tom’s Country Gold radio program on WNCW 88.7. We are road musicians and stream his wonderful show from wherever we are. I must confess that we’ve used Tom’s vast knowledge of country music and good taste to add to our own repertoire. Thanks for the inspiration, Tom.”

— Dudley Connell - Seldom Scene, Three-time Grammy nominee

About The Show

Endorsements

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