Last year’s brand new Sunday Night Football theme “Game On” co-written by Carrie Underwood reportedly left fans underwhelmed. Adding insult to injury, the American Idol season 4 winner and her co-writers are being sued for copyright infringement by an artist who insists her song was ripped off.
What to do? Go back to basics and then some.
NBC’s Sunday Night Football, will unveil an all-new show open with Carrie Underwood this season, with a nod to the first-ever NBC SNF open in 2006 featuring a new rendition of the original “Waiting All Day for Sunday Night” music.
Carrie will star in the NBC SNF show open for the seventh consecutive year and will welcome Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Joan Jett, who makes an appearance during Carrie’s performance.
At the invitation of Carrie, Joan – whose 1988 Top 10 hit “I Hate Myself for Loving You” was adapted for the original “Waiting All Day for Sunday Night” SNF show open music in 2006 – appears for the first time in the NBC Sunday Night Football opener. Carrie will also be joined by NFL stars (to be announced on Monday) in the new show open. The song served as the theme from 2006-2015. In 2016, Carrie introduced “Oh, Sunday Night”, based on her 2014 duet hit with Miranda Lambert, “Somethin’ Bad.” In 2018 “Game On” became the theme.
“I have always been a huge fan of Joan’s, and I’m thrilled that she’s joining us for the Sunday Night Football open,” Carrie said. “What better way to pay homage to the original SNF opening song than by getting to play with her on primetime’s biggest stage?”
Carrie and Joan joined forces for the first time at CMA Fest in June where they performed a trio of rock classics, “I Hate Myself for Loving You,” “Bad Reputation” and “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll.”
“When Carrie brought us this idea, we immediately embraced it as a terrific way to evolve the performance, while also celebrating the song we used in our first 10 seasons of SNF,” said Fred Gaudelli, Executive Producer of NBC’s Sunday Night Football. “We were excited when Joan agreed to join us, and we can’t wait to debut the finished product.”
At halftime of this Sunday night’s preseason game on NBC (Pittsburgh Steelers at Tennessee Titans, 8 p.m. ET), a sneak preview of the SNF show open will air. The full 2019 NBC Sunday Night Football show open will debut on Sunday, Sept. 8, as the Super Bowl champion New England Patriots host the Pittsburgh Steelers.
For the first time in the series’ 14 seasons, the SNF show open was filmed inside an NFL stadium, with Mercedes-Benz Stadium, home of the Atlanta Falcons, serving as the “stage.”
