It's taken more than a year to get it ready, but The Impressions' "I'm Coming Home (For Christmas)" will be in stores Tuesday, according to Fred Cash.

Cash said the CD is already available online at the usual outlets.

I'm a big fan of Christmas music and have a decent collection featuring metal, rap, country, corny, really bad, really good, spiritual and classical versions of new and traditional holiday music, and this has become one of my favorites.

The album features some classics and some lessor-known numbers, as well as the title track, which is brand new.

As a special bonus, Cash and fellow charter member Sam Gooden, along with newest member Reginald Torian, rerecorded "Amen." It was originally recorded in 1963 and included in the movie "Lilies of the Field."

"We cut it over again with John P. Kee and his gospel choir," Cash said.

"We saw it in that movie (in 1963) with Sidney Portier and went back in the studio and did it," Cash said. "Within two weeks, it sold 600,000 copies."

It is still beautiful.

* According to Paul Grove, president of WTCI-TV 45, the station earlier this year looked at ways to partner with fellow public broadcaster WUTC-FM 88.1 in hopes of strengthening both, particularly in fundraising.

"We looked into ways of possibly securing joint funding through grants and discovered that the money just wasn't there," he said.

"We wanted to find a way to work together in the best interest of the community."

Grove said he first approached UTC Chancellor Roger Brown about the idea earlier this year. Grove said the idea of the local public radio and television stations working together has been done elsewhere, in particular in Cleveland, Ohio, where WVIZ-TV and WCPN came together to form Ideastream, a multi-media organization that goes beyond the traditional roles we think of for public broadcasting.

"It was more than just television and radio," Grove said of Ideastream. "It was a whole new concept with a whole new discourse."

Grove said the idea has been put on the back burner.

* Last week's Prostate Cancer Awareness Walk at Raccoon Mountain was a lot of fun, if for no other reason than I got to see the sun rise over the mountains around Cleveland and I got to look down on the River Gorge, which was covered in a layer of clouds so white and thick, I'd have sworn a person could walk across them.

It was a good way to start the day and was followed by an 8-mile hike on the fairly new trail carved out by the local Southeast Off-Road Bicycle Association.

Folks, if it's been awhile since you've played tourist in your own hometown, make a date to get out and see what's out there.

E-mail Barry Courter at bcourter@timesfreepress.com