"My boyhood heroes were not Dick Tracy or Flash Gordon or Superman or things like that," Tommy Hunter recalls. "My boyhood heroes were the Roy Acuffs and the Ernest Tubbs and Marty Robbins and Jim Reeves."

As an adult, Hunter was able to work with all those heroes and more, and in the process become one himself. Each week for 27 years, Canadians faithfully watched a parade of homegrown and imported stars on CBC's The Tommy Hunter Show.

On March 16, CBC will bring Hunter back for a one-off show that will reunite the host with longtime cast (and crew) members in addition to presenting a few notable guest stars. It's part of the CBC's campaign to celebrate 50 years of broadcasting and to temporarily right a few wrongs, like the 1992 cancellation of the still-popular show.

"It's water under the bridge now," Hunter says of his show's falling victim to an ill-fated quest for a hipper CBC image. "We've moved on to other things and I enjoy doing tours."

Tours like the one that brings him to Centrepointe Theatre this evening. Hunter promises he and his band The Travellin' Men will provide "a bunch of memories, a bunch of songs we featured on television and a nostalgic trip down memory lane."

That trip will no doubt conjure up memories of Al Cherney, Maurice Bolyer, the Rhythm Pals, Donna & Leroy, and the Allen Sisters. Not to mention the A-list of Nashville stars who once journeyed north to be part of a Canadian television institution.

'PROFESSIONALISM'

"Once they knew about our show we never had to contact anybody. Glen Campbell, George Jones, Waylon Jennings ... they used to call us," Hunter says with pride. "The artists knew that they would look good and sound good. There was professionalism; it wasn't hokey.

"I hated that image of that hayseed-barnyard type of thing. It just drove me crazy. And that was back in the days when that was in vogue; every country music show threw in bales of hay and everybody dressed in dungarees and played in a barn. I thought, 'Are we always gonna be pigeonholed into this type of thing?'

"I got tired of people laughing at me for what I did. I felt our music had progressed to a point where we didn't have to apologize for it anymore. That's why I worked very hard to get it out of the barn -- I thought that more people would really like our music and if I packaged it differently, maybe they would sit and watch it. Which is exactly what they've done."

Hunter admits he did not intend to hasten country music's descent down a glitzy slippery slope. He just wanted to take it out of the barn.

"We tried to do it like a one-on-one, that was the way the show was really set up," Hunter explains. "If Hank Snow was on, you really got a chance to see Hank. And you heard him the way you remember his records. When he'd look at the camera, you really got a snootful of Hank Snow. That's what we wanted."

Contrast that with America's favourite country-music show of the time, Hee Haw, a show that never strayed from the barnyard. Hunter's insistence on giving the audience a proper one-on-one visit with artists drew many an eager new face to The Tommy Hunter Show, from Garth Brooks and Alan Jackson to a 15-year-old then billing herself as Ellie Twain.

SHANIA TWAIN

"The Shania Twain you see today is not the Ellie Twain I saw as a little girl, because you now see it packaged and all put together," Hunter says. "But sometimes you can just see there's something there. It was the same thing with Anne Murray when she was a young girl. You can listen to that voice and say, 'There's something there.' "

Hunter himself, despite nearly three decades as a household name, confesses he never cared for the recording studio. And despite a brief flirtation with Billboard success, he has maintained a low profile even as he has continued to make records for his loyal fans.

Of course, he says, Canadian country success sometimes assures a low profile. He recalls, for instance, his reaction to topping the Canadian country charts some years back: "I've got a No. 1 record and my phone hasn't started to ring -- What's wrong with this picture."

Hunter also acknowledges without any apparent bitterness that there is no room for a traditional country artist on today's radio stations. He offers O Brother Where Art Thou as Exhibit A.

"Here's an album that has generated millions," Hunter observes, "and they won't play it because it breaks the formula. You go from the hottest No. 1 current song to Ralph Stanley and there's such a contrast that they look at it and say, 'Are they kidding? What do we do?' They can't break the formula, so they say, 'Well, we'll just have to ignore it. It never really happened.' "

Fans in attendance at Centrepointe this evening will confirm The Tommy Hunter Show happened. And that the man at the centre of that phenomenon is still going strong, without the aid of barn or camera.

"It's wonderful," a grateful Hunter says. "People bring mom and dad to the show and they say, 'I remember as a little girl growing up, your show would come on and we had to be quiet. We had to watch your show. We didn't want to, but we watched it.' "

Tickets for tonight's show at 7 are $33.50 and available at the Centrepointe box-office.