Willie Geist to tape a live ‘Sunday Sitdown’ with Luke Combs in Nashville for NBC

A network interview format moves from studio to a Nashville stage

NBC’s “Sunday TODAY with Willie Geist” is scheduled to record a live edition of its long-running “Sunday Sitdown” interview segment in Nashville, featuring country musician Luke Combs. The event is set for January 19, 2026, at City Winery Nashville, a ticketed venue on Lafayette Street near downtown.

The Nashville program follows the launch of “Sunday Sitdown LIVE,” an extension of the broadcast interview franchise that typically appears within the Sunday morning newsmagazine hour. The concept places the interview in front of an audience rather than in a controlled studio environment, turning a television segment into a one-night live taping designed for later broadcast distribution.

What is known about the Nashville taping

• Date and place: The live taping is scheduled for January 19, 2026, at City Winery Nashville, 609 Lafayette St.

• Participants: Willie Geist will interview Luke Combs in an on-stage conversation format.

• Production approach: The program is being marketed as an in-person taping of the “Sunday Sitdown” segment, indicating the conversation is intended for later airing within the “Sunday TODAY” ecosystem.

Luke Combs’ Nashville ties and why the location matters

Combs, born in 1990 in North Carolina, moved to Nashville as his career accelerated and later became one of the genre’s most commercially prominent artists of the last decade. His debut studio album, “This One’s for You,” released on June 2, 2017, helped establish him as a major presence in country radio and touring.

The choice of Nashville is also significant because it reframes a nationally televised interview as a hometown-industry event in a city that functions as country music’s primary business hub. City Winery’s layout—designed for seated shows—fits the requirements of a televised conversation while keeping the feel of a live performance room.

What viewers and attendees can expect from the format

The live edition is designed to bring the audience into the taping process, with the conversation conducted onstage in front of ticket holders rather than solely for cameras.

While details of the interview topics have not been released as a formal rundown, the event description indicates a career-spanning discussion expected to revisit Combs’ early steps in music and the development of his best-known songs. The “Sunday Sitdown” format generally emphasizes biography and personal narrative, rather than a promotional press conference structure.

For Nashville, the taping represents another example of national morning television programming treating the city not only as a backdrop for music coverage, but as a venue for major network content production in front of a live audience.