04/18/17 - Day 15 - Nashville, TN - Country Music HOF & Grand Ole Opry
Visited both the Country Music Hall of Fame and Grand Ole Opry Tuesday afternoon. Spent nearly three hours touring the hall located in downtown. It does a good job exploring the roots of country music, its transition through the age of radio and then television, and has some interesting temporary exhibits as well. Being a relative new comer, as I didn't start listening to it until the last 1990's, I really wasn't familiar with most of the early folks or some of the significant events. I didn't know anything about the impact Bob Dylan's visit to Nashville and his work with Johnny Cash in the 60's. The museum has an entire exhibit dedicated to it.
Gotta get one of those red jackets
Webb Pierce, one of those folks I wasn't familiar with ordered this bizarre custom 1962 Cadillac
Hells yeah
After the museum I headed north of town to visit the Grand Ole Opry.
Grand Ole Opry is a live two and half hour radio show performed in an auditorium of about 4400 people. It's a round-robin of artists that each play about three songs each, so it's not really a concert, more like a flight of beers, except with music instead of beer. On Tuesday they had:
Bill Anderson, who I understand is a fixture at this thing
William Micheal Morgan ("I Met a Girl")
Sunny Sweeny
Parmalee ("I'm Already Calling You Mine")
Lorrie Morgan and Pam Tillis
Del McCoury Band (blue grass)
and Chris Janson ("Buy me a Boat")
I splurged for the show and backstage tour combo so my ticket was front and center about a dozen rows back from the stage. The sound in this place was fantastic, which I guess makes sense if they're going to broadcast it.
The show host
William Micheal Morgan
Parmale
I'm Already Calling You Mine
The Del McCoury Band
Chris Janson. Dude is tiny. He said he was only 135 but he went HAM on the stage
Caffeine overload
Pretty cool experience. Immediately followed by the backstage tour. About 100 folks got split up into half a dozen groups to be lead shotgun style around the venue. We walked up on the stage.
Stood in the performers circle (which is a big deal to a lot of folks since it's a piece of wood cut from one of the original classic venues)
We saw the television studio where Hee Haw used to be filmed (it's empty now). We got to see the private entrance the artists use and take a peek into all the dressing rooms.
We also saw the aftermath of the 2010 floods that hit Nashville so hard and that I'd forgotten all about. The change in color in the wall marks the water level inside the venue during the flood.
Hard to tell in this photo, but our guide looked a little like early Penny from Big Bang Theory TV show, which really only enhanced the tour for me
Long day but it was fun
Gotta get one of those red jackets
Webb Pierce, one of those folks I wasn't familiar with ordered this bizarre custom 1962 Cadillac
Hells yeah
After the museum I headed north of town to visit the Grand Ole Opry.
Grand Ole Opry is a live two and half hour radio show performed in an auditorium of about 4400 people. It's a round-robin of artists that each play about three songs each, so it's not really a concert, more like a flight of beers, except with music instead of beer. On Tuesday they had:
Bill Anderson, who I understand is a fixture at this thing
William Micheal Morgan ("I Met a Girl")
Sunny Sweeny
Parmalee ("I'm Already Calling You Mine")
Lorrie Morgan and Pam Tillis
Del McCoury Band (blue grass)
and Chris Janson ("Buy me a Boat")
I splurged for the show and backstage tour combo so my ticket was front and center about a dozen rows back from the stage. The sound in this place was fantastic, which I guess makes sense if they're going to broadcast it.
The show host
William Micheal Morgan
Parmale
I'm Already Calling You Mine
The Del McCoury Band
Chris Janson. Dude is tiny. He said he was only 135 but he went HAM on the stage
Caffeine overload
Pretty cool experience. Immediately followed by the backstage tour. About 100 folks got split up into half a dozen groups to be lead shotgun style around the venue. We walked up on the stage.
Stood in the performers circle (which is a big deal to a lot of folks since it's a piece of wood cut from one of the original classic venues)
We saw the television studio where Hee Haw used to be filmed (it's empty now). We got to see the private entrance the artists use and take a peek into all the dressing rooms.
We also saw the aftermath of the 2010 floods that hit Nashville so hard and that I'd forgotten all about. The change in color in the wall marks the water level inside the venue during the flood.
Hard to tell in this photo, but our guide looked a little like early Penny from Big Bang Theory TV show, which really only enhanced the tour for me
Long day but it was fun
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