Nashville: “Music City, U.S.A.”

Nashville: “Music City,U.S.A.”

No film about American music could be complete without touching down in Tennessee, home to Nashville – aka “Music City, U.S.A.” Early settlers in rural Tennessee brought their Scottish and Irish folk songs with them and by the 19th Century, the city was world already attracting musicians from around the world. There too, cultures combined, with traditional folks

songs and fiddles merging with British ballads, cowboy songs, the Africanbanjos brought to American by slaves and the everyday stories of farmers,cowboys and working people.

Originally called “hillbilly music,” country music was largely a community affairuntil the rise of radio, which brought the music, and its themes of ordinary life– of love, work, struggle and family — to much larger audiences. In 1925, theGrand Ole Opry opened, igniting the careers of one country star after another,and influencing every other form of American music. To this day, Nashvilleremains a mecca for songwriters of all kinds, who arrive into a diversecommunity of artists who share in common the same dream of joining theroster of musical influencers.

The MFF team was especially exhilarated to be able to shoot at the Grand Ole Opry’s storied Ryman Auditorium, a sacred site for music lovers. Named for steamboat captain and Nashville businessman ThomasG. Ryman, it is here where the bluegrass sound got its start, where Johnny Cash met June

Carter, and where a teenage Elvis Presley took the stage in 1954, hypnotizingthe audience. Renovated and revitalized in the 1990s it is now once again aworld-class performance arena drawing contemporary artists – but everyonecan feel the ghosts of the artistic past amid the ambience.