Tom Turkey at The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 2020.
Peter Kramer/NBC/NBCU Photo Bank via Getty ImagesThanksgiving Day is just around the corner, and with holiday travel a bit safer this year thanks to coronavirus vaccines and booster shots, there will be families and friends once again gathering around the country to celebrate.
There will also be plenty to watch — from the 95th Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to musical specials from Reba McEntire, Smokey Robinson, Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett, and more.
Many specials this weekend will air on NBC, CBS, Hallmark channel or ABC. If you have cable (or a digital TV antenna like this one from Amazon), you can watch them all on TV through your local network affiliate.
If you’ve cut the cord, a variety of networks can also be streamed using SlingTV, fuboTV, or Hulu + Live TV. All of these services offer free trials, which will allow you to watch the Thanksgiving fun for free online without cable.
See below for Billboard‘s roundup of all the best music-related TV programming to watch all weekend long over plate after plate of leftovers.
Thursday (Nov. 25)
95th Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade – 9 a.m. ET on NBC
CBS Thanksgiving Day Parade – 9 a.m. ET on CBS
Christmas at Dollywood — 8 a.m. ET on Hallmark Channel
Friday (Nov. 26)
Reba McEntire’s Christmas in Tune – 8 p.m. ET on Lifetime
A Nashville Christmas Carol — 6 a.m. ET on Hallmark Channel
Sunday (Nov. 28)
The Wonderful World of Disney: Magical Holiday Celebration – 7 p.m. ET on ABC
Miracle in Motor City starring Smokey Robinson – 8 p.m. ET on Lifetime
One Last Time: An Evening with Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga – 8 p.m. ET on CBS; streaming afterwards on Paramount+
Christmas in Tahoe — 8 p.m. ET on Hallmark Channel
Streaming
The Beatles: Get Back — premiering in three parts on Thursday (Nov. 25), Friday (Nov. 26) and Saturday (Nov. 27) on Disney+
A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving – now on Apple TV+
8-Bit Christmas – starting Thursday (Nov. 25) on HBO Max
Jonas Brothers: Family Roast – now on Netflix
NEWS
Say what you will about the UMG defamation lawsuit over "Not Like Us," but it hasn't been difficult for Drake to stay on top in any case. Whether you think the industry is trying to take him down or people dismissed him as their champion, you're probably missing the big picture.
According to Hip Hop All Day on Twitter, the Toronto superstar became the first rapper to surpass 5 billion streams on Spotify in 2025, continuing his stretch this year as the most streamed rapper on the platform. Others aren't too far behind, but these continually impressive commercial numbers are hard to knock off.
Of course, there are a few reasons for this. One of them is the OVO mogul's recent collab album with PARTYNEXTDOOR, $ome $exy $ongs 4 U. Both the Billboard Hot 100 success of the solo cut "NOKIA" plus rapid sales for the project as a whole translate to a whole lot of engagement on the digital streaming platform.
Another driving factor behind Drake's numbers is the anticipation for his next album (albeit with no release date), which he recently confirmed he's working on during a gambling livestream with Adin Ross. As such, we imagine a lot of die-hards are probably coming back to their favorite catalog material to prepare for their wildest dreams – if they weren't already bumping The Boy nonstop to begin with.
Even Kanye West is giving the 6ix God his props these days, even though his long-standing beef with Drizzy is constantly a subject of his flip-flopping tendencies. "This is the biggest victory in music history, right here," Ye said of the UMG lawsuit. "I'm never finna call Drake out of his name. I'm Team Drake, 100 percent. And Team Kendrick, and Team All Of Us... Kendrick needs to be going at UMG at this point. [...] Like, let's stop aiming all this at each other. You have no idea. Everything is worth everything for a moment like this. Where we stop going at each other and we go at the slave masters."
Will Drake be successful and impactful with this? That's up to the court to decide, and up to the industry and its artists to reckon with following their decision. But in the meantime, that Spotify revenue is looking beefy.
