When you’re portraying country music’s latest star, it helps to be able to sing. Fortunately for Hayden Panettiere, who stars as Music City wild child Juliette Barnes in ABC’s anticipated new drama Nashville, the actress is perfectly comfortable belting it out on-camera. But her onstage debut in front of throngs of country fans at last summer's CMA Music Festival took some getting used to.

"I have to get used to singing onstage, because I have some serious stage fright," she admitted then. Still, she quickly found out she was not only in good voice, but in good hands. "The fans here are so open and welcoming, and they don’t care if you hit a wrong note. They cheer for you! That's even true amongst the artists themselves. They cheer each other on, which is really wonderful."

Nashville premieres tomorrow night (Wednesday, Oct. 10) at 10 pm ET on ABC. 

For more on Hayden and the series, pick up the current issue of Country Weekly.