83-year-old Grand Ole Opry in Tennessee offers captions for hearing impaired

Opry in Tenn. offers captions for hearing impaired

NASHVILLE, Tenn. — The Grand Ole Opry remains steeped in a tradition of sound, but the 83-year-old country music program will offer captions for the hearing impaired for the first time Saturday.

About 450 people participating at the Hearing Loss Association of America convention in Nashville this week will attend one of the Opry’s evening shows and will be able to follow along with captions on large projection screens.

Vince Gill, Alison Krauss, Hal Ketchum, Little Jimmy Dickens and others are set to perform.

Vice president and general manager of the Opry, Pete Fisher, said the show is somewhat of an experiment and captions may be used again in the future.

“It is somewhat of a paradox our show that has a 80 plus-year history and presents over six decades of music each week to be on the cutting edge of technology,” Fisher said. “But we’ve been committed to employing state of the art technology.”

Nancy Macklin, director of events for the association, said the group asked the Opry about the captioning since many convention attendees wanted to see a show. Macklin said captioning at entertainment venues, including sports stadiums, is growing.

The association estimates nearly 36 million people in the U.S. have some degree of hearing loss.

“The technology has been around, but more and more venues are using it as hard-of-hearing people are requesting it,” Macklin said. “They (Opry) now know it exists and it’s available.”

On the Net:

Hearing Loss Association of America: www.hearingloss.org/

The Grand Ole Opry: www.opry.com/