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All the contestants in Reese Witherspoon’s show can sing, play and perform – and Nashville’s pros are there to help, not humiliate, them. It’s a breath of fresh airFor those of you – for those of us – who have been broken on the wheel of secondhand embarrassment over the last few hundred years (or whenever reality TV and singing etc competitions began), My Kind of Country will come as balm to the soul. All the contestants have the goods: they can sing, they can play, they can perform and have in many cases years of experience under their belts. And the judges (country singer-songwriters Jimmie Allen, Mickey Guyton and Orville Peck), who have scouted and champion four contestants each, are there to help not humiliate them. The relief is tremendous, even if you do have to hear an awful lot about hopes, dreams, journeys and other guff.Nevermind. It’s worth it, overall. The show – executive produced by Reese Witherspoon and country star Kacey Musgraves – is designed to find country singers who do not fit the traditional Nashville mould. Allen and Guyton, who are both Black, each auditioned for American Idol early in their careers but were cut before the voting rounds and have had to negotiate the intangible barriers that stood between them and mainstream success. Peck, a gay South African musician, has had his troubles within a notably conservative and white genre, too.My Kind of Country is on Apple TV+ Continue reading...