Christian Music Network

Christian Music Network (commonly shortened to CMN) is an American basic cable television network owned by RJH Media. The network airs music videos from a wide variety of Christian music artists, including genres such as traditional and contemporary gospel, Christian rock and pop, southern gospel, Christian hip hop, Christian alternative rock and Christian metal; as well as various related programs.

Early years (1986-1997)
On February 18, 1986, the Christian Music Network was established as a new network. The network was originally a joint-venture between R.J. Hawkins Broadcasting, and the Gaylord Entertainment Company. Through Gaylord, the network was a sister network to The Nashville Network. The first music video to play on CMN was "Honestly" by Stryper. When CMN launched, it is the first music channel entirely devoted to Christians.

In 1991, Gaylord would purchase TNN's rival CMT. As a result of this, TNN would drop its country music from its lineup and would focus more on entertainment and lifestyle programming, with CMT picking up many of TNN's country programming and CMN picking up much of TNN's Christian country music library. On July 8, 1992, an European feed of CMN would launch, this feed now operates as MTV Crush, and now plays mostly hits from the 80s and 90s.

During its ownership with Gaylord, the network would cross promote its sister networks CMT and TNN throughout various programs. Alongside that, TNN would help co-produce select programming from CMN.

Brief ownership by CBS; RJH Media takes over CMN (1997-present)
Westinghouse, who was the owner of CBS at the time would acquire Gaylord's cable networks in 1997, putting them under the newly formed CBS Cable division. While the company retained CMN's European feed, CBS would only own CMN's original American feed for only a year. In 1998, RJH Media would purchase CBS's stake in CMN, putting CMN officially under common ownership with KBCP Family and KBCP-TV.