THE MANY SIDES OF
NASHVILLE
by Rich Rubin
Visiting Nashville is like buying a three-CD
set. Depending on which CD you listen to, you’ll
hear a totally different sound. Side 1 is the familiar
Nashville, the country music Nashville. It’s full
of the songs from stars you’d expect to hear in Nashville:
Loretta Lynn, Dolly Parton, Porter Wagoner, and Charley
Pride, etc. Put the second CD in the player and you’ll
encounter something quite different: a gracious, historic,
artistic Nashville, the Nashville of grand mansions and
gardens. Every tune’s got a flip side, after all,
and nowhere is that more evident in this town built on
music. Surprised? Just wait. There’s a third CD in
the set, and it’s the most recently-produced: a hip
Nashville of galleries, chic restaurants, cool little
coffeehouses, and a growing alternative scene, from a
burgeoning rock music presence to several fun gay bars.
While this CD shows obvious influences from the artists
on the first two, it’s a more recent phenomenon,
and just ten years ago, on my last visit to Nashville,
I saw very few signs that this new one could ever be produced
here.
Maybe it’s best, though, to start
at the beginning. Let’s put the first CD in our
imaginary player and explore what made Nashville famous
to start with. The first song on CD 1 is the Ryman Auditorium,
where the Grand Ole Opry was born and where every big
name in country music performed. Formerly a church,
the gracefully-curving and acoustically-perfect auditorium
right at the heart of downtown Nashville hosted performers
such as Mae West, Rudolf Valentino, and John Barrymore.
Marian Anderson appeared here. Dorothy Lamour brought
her variety review. Most importantly, though, in 1943,
radio’s longest-running show—the Grand Ole
Opry—began recording here, and by the time the
Opry moved out in 1974, the Ryman had truly earned its
name as the “Mother Church of Country Music.”
You’ll see mementos of all the greats, from Minnie
to Trisha to Tammy. Need a more tangible reminder of
your visit? Have your picture taken, guitar in hand,
on the stage, or make a record in their recording booth.
Next stop, Studio B, where Elvis recorded
numerous songs, Dolly Parton crashed her car into the
front wall (you can still see the dented brick), and
everyone from Dottie West and Gentleman Jim Brady to
Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings recorded their hits.
That night, I check out the Grand Ole
Opry’s current home, where the jokes are hokey
but the sound and lighting system ultra-high tech. Sometimes
you want to stand and cheer, sometimes you want to yell
“get the hook”—but that’s the Opry
in all its democratically nasal splendor. I also visit
the “honky tonks,” a series of bars along
downtown Nashville’s Broadway, where live music
is performed day and night and there’s never a
cover charge. Tootsie’s, Robert’s Western
Wear, The Orchid Lounge…these are legendary names
in the biz, backing onto the Ryman (Opry performers
used to sneak across to the honky tonks since the church
atmosphere of the Ryman forbade drinking). Grab a beer,
settle in at one, or circulate among half a dozen, and
you’ll discover the next country star, hear something
awful, or anything in between.
The best place for an overview of the
scene is the Country Music Hall of Fame. In their permanent
exhibit, “Sing Me Back Home—A Journey through
Country Music,” panels, objects, photos, and sound
installations trace the history of the genre. Artifacts
here include an early ad for AP Carter and the Carter
Family (“this program is morally good”), Patsy
Montana’s ornately Orientalist cowboy boots, Tex
Ritter’s silver-plated saddle, Pee Wee King’s
accordion, and a slew of amazingly gaudy suits by Nudie
the Rodeo Tailor, suitmaker to the stars.
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Meanwhile, “Family Tradition: The
Williams Family Legacy,” is an astoundingly sophisticated
exploration of Hank Williams and his descendents, running
through December 2009. Touch screens pull up images from
family scrapbooks, and video footage traces their tragic
and larger-than-life lives. There isn’t a more dramatic
or star-crossed family in all of country music, and this
ambitious exhibit is a moving retelling of their story.
Another great overview (am I really
suggesting this?) is a Gray Line tour. While I’m
not usually a fan of these things, the drivers are friendly,
funny, and incredibly knowledgeable, and it’s a
great orientation to a city so full of quirky history.
You can even do a specialized tour of anything from
Civil War sites to “Jack Daniels Country”
to homes of country music stars (Nashville’s own
version of the famous Hollywood stars tour, and much
more fun!).
As countrified Disc 1 comes to an end
with a lush slide guitar riff, Disc 2 breezes in like
the wind whispering through a magnolia tree, with the
coolness of a fresh glass of lemonade. This disc includes
such beautiful hits as the Hermitage, former home of
President Andrew Jackson, with a small museum of Andrew
and Rachel Jackson’s lives, gorgeous grounds, and
the 1843 mansion with its amazing wallpaper murals,
canopied beds, brass fireplace guards, and elegant furniture.
Also on this disc is Travellers Rest, a history lesson
in brick and stone, having been built in 1799 and continually
added to, from a simple Federal style to more embellished
Victorian additions. Walking trails run throughout the
grounds, and guided tours of the house show you the
pageant of history it represents. So, too, with gracious
Belle Meade, a plantation house just outside town, which
once housed a stud farm, smokehouse, gristmill, and
quarries. The highlight of a visit is a tour through
the fabulous house, with fourteen fireplaces, amazingly-grained
wooden doors (look closely, and you’ll see that
all the graining is faux), ornate chandeliers, great
gilded mirrors, and period furnishings. If you think
Nashville is all about twang and twitter, a visit to
Belle Meade is likely to cure you of that misconception
right quick.
Disc 2, however, is not solely a thing
of the past, as you can see at gorgeous Schermerhorn
Symphony Center, opened in September 2006, and as lovely
a neo-classical concert hall as you’re likely to
see, with marble floors, tall white pillars, hanging
Art Deco-ish fixtures, and filigree panels. The auditorium
is acoustically as well as physically spectacular, airy,
cool, and clean. They do pop and jazz series as well
as classical, with everyone from John Prine and Lyle
Lovett to LeAnn Rimes and Elvis Costello having performed
here (most of them with the well-regarded Nashville
Symphony). Across town, the Parthenon is as beautiful
a city monument as exists anywhere. It’s an exact
replica of the Greek original, built for the 1897 Tennessee
Centennial Exposition and still the prettiest building
in town, with its Doric columns, 7.5 ton bronze doors,
and massive Athena that’s thought to be the country’s
largest indoor statue.
Having worked up an appetite from so
much sightseeing, I’m glad to discover Fido’s
near Vanderbilt University west of downtown. It’s
a hip little coffeehouse with a nice mix of musicians,
Vanderbilt kids, and other “alternative types.”
As one local friend puts it: “You see lots of dads
with kids there. That tells you something.” Just
down the street, the elegant baked goods of Provence
call to me from a case with some of the most luscious
pastries you’ve ever seen: opera torte, double
chocolate mousse, peanut butter mousse au fromage, berry
terrines looking like perfect little glazed domes that
Fabergé might have created. I stay moderately
good with a spiced pecan scone until my eye is caught
by Valrhona boucherons on the counter—they’re
little pyramids of dark chocolate perfection. “I
don’t know if I can pass those up,” I say.
The sweet young counterman’s response: “Well,
you don’t want to pass them up, even if you could.”
I add one to my plate. It’s like the best thing
I’ve ever eaten in my life.
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