Cowboy Boots!

Getting ready for the show

The Grand Ole Opry is an institution of Country Music. It started up as a weekly radio show broadcasted by WSM in 1925 and has been running as a radio show ever since. Historians agree that it had a major impact on the course of American music. It was the first time that country/hillbilly was available across the whole continent. For many this was the first time that they could hear live music and it also acted as a conduit to share musical styles from one area to another. Both whites and blacks listened and incorporated these new ideas into their own musical language.

The programme has a strange format with the DJ reading out the sponsors messages in between each act. The night’s act included Connie Smith, George Hamilton 4^th, Jesse McReynolds, Big Kenny, Little Jimmy Dickens and the current heart-throb of Country Music Josh Turner. They are all big names in Country Music and their acts were highly slick and professional. It really was a great evening. The audience was responsive and knowledgeable.

One of the great stars of the evening was Little Jimmy Dickens. He is 89 and still as sharp as anything. He delighted the audience with his jokes and innuendos.

This was exclusively a white audience and it made me think back to T Model Ford in Clarksdale, Mississippi. T Model is the same age but his life is so different. There is no Grand Ole Opry or Hall of Fame for these black legends. Who will honour and remember them?

Whatever, we had a great night and I am proud to say that I have visited the grand Ole Opry and I thoroughly recommend it.

The Girls are dressed up for the Ole Opry

Little Jimmy Dickens

George Hamilton 4th (With George Hamilton 5th)

Josh Turner in concert at the Grand Ole Opry

Nashville like Memphis and New Orleans has a central street where all the music is played. In Nashville it comprises of the bottom of 2^nd and turning right down Broadway. The area throbs at night with most of the bars playing live music.

Our first stop today was the Country Music Museum and Hall of Fame. The Museum takes the visitor on a journey through time, identifying and illustrating milestones in Country Music. The first floor is excellent and I really understood how this music developed from all the diverse influences. The second floor was less informative, showing mainly memorabilia and artefacts from the recent stars. The museum had wonderful exhibits including the Patsy Cline’s dress and Hank William’s famous suit (shown below).

Hank Williams' suit

Patsy Cline's dress

Elvis' gold piano

What does the best-dressed cowboy wear around town? Well these intrepid travellers went to look at some cowboy boots. I was expressly told, not to bring a pair of boots home with me. Well good news, I did not buy a pair but unfortunately acquired 3 instead. Nashville salesmen are very persuasive and it’s difficult to say no! The slightly better news is that the shop was offering 3 pairs for the price of one. So we all spilt it and came away with 3 very cheap pairs of boots. Forgive me Jacqui!

What does the best dressed cowboy wear around town?

What today's cowboy retirees are wearing? Nice legs!

We met an up and coming Country Music star who had come to Nashville from Texas to meet agents in town. Her name is Deidre Thornell. Please look at her website www.deidrethornell.com. Good luck Deidre.

Aspiring Country Star Deidre Thornell

Sixty different beers on tap. Oh dear!!

The Hard Rock Caffe

True John Le Hooker style!

Our Hotel was originally built by Country Star Roger Miller but has now been taken over by a multiple and renamed. Guess what it was called?........"King of the Road Motel". Sounds netter than the Day's Inn!

Roger Miller's "King of the Road" hotel

George Hamilton 4th in concert with his son George Hamilton 5th

Josh Turner

Along the Music Road to Nashville

Nashville

Night time on Beale

I was up at 6.00 am this morning to see the sunrise on the Mississippi and came across Jefferson Park and the Jefferson Davies Memorial. It’s so strange that the inscription mentions all President Jefferson’s many achievements, except being president of the Confederacy. The newspaper yesterday ran an article on the pressure coming from the Southern States to rewrite some of the school curriculum in order to give a more balanced view on the Confederacy, Jefferson Davies and the legitimacy of the Confederate cause. By the way, he was of Welsh descent.

Dawn at the Mississippi

The monument to Jefferson Davies

I love travelling in this country. It is very beautiful but it is also wasteful. The US has the highest per capita carbon footprint in the world. This sense of waste is everywhere from the ubiquitous gas guzzlers/ SUVs to the disposability of day-to-day life. I enclose a photograph of the waste that we generated over breakfast on one meal alone. All these disposable utensils and plates will go into landfill. They are made from polystyrene and plastic (Petroleum products) and are not biodegradable. If this is the waste that 3 guys produce then the impact of this waste problem across the whole US population is inexcusable. A fleet of large buses ferries tourists the 200 meters from the reception area to the Graceland mansion. Conversion to electricity would be easy to do. Elvis would have approved!

Waste at breakfast. All into landfill and not biodegradable

A sign on the wall at Stax Records says “Music was made here and so was magic”

The original building was demolished in 1980 but a replica was recently rebuilt as close as possible to the original design. This is a run down part of town, full of boarded up shops and a distinct stamp of poverty. The true Soul fan would brand this a fake but the exhibition is good and we came out bopping after hearing that wonderful Soul sound again. We were as the early Stax recording stars described “In the Stax groove”

Soul music comes from a blend of Gospel, Blues, Country and Jazz. The two major influences were Gospel and Blues. Gospel was how you communicated with your God while Blues was about communicating with your fellow man.

My first experience of Soul was hearing Otis Redding singing “Dock of the Bay” on Top of The Pops (on film as he was already dead by then) at boarding school. I subsequently bought a LP called “Soul Sampler” put out by Atlantic Records which had all the great names such as Clarla & Rufus Thomas, Percy Sledge, Otis Reading, Wilson Picket, Sam & Dave and many more. It was such “Sweet Music” then and remains so today giving you a happy sense of wellbeing. Its about feeling good about yourself.

It appears that Martin Luther King’s death also impacted on the Memphis music scene. Before then, the label and its music was not tainted by racial and social issues but all was however about to change. Stax continued in business until the mid seventies when to everyone’s shock it went under. The new museum has been built with a music academy next door. Many of those early Stax artists (Booker T Jones, Isaac Hayes, Rufus & Clara Thomas, Aretha Franklin, Memphis Slim etc..) came from the area and its great to see the Stax influence returning something to the community.

The Stax pinacle standing high above the new academy for local kids

Soulville USA

The famous Stax logo

Memphis Slim's home near Stax Records

Ask your friends in the UK about country music and most will tell you that they don’t like country music. In the privacy of a bar and a few beers they will often admit to being closet country fans. This is certainly the case with the 3 of us. I don’t like the glitzy, sequined singing cowboys but I love the alternative outlaw country music. It’s hard to find better musicianship and record production any where in the world. We have decided to go to Nashville. It’s not the Blues but its difficult not to get onto Interstate 40 (The Music Road) and bypass this great city.

Country music grew out of what people called “Hillbilly” and is heavily influenced by Irish and Scottish music. This is the white man’s blues. It is not a coincidence that Nashville and Memphis should be so close together. Modern popular music needed these two genres to come together to give us what we have today.

Nashville from our hotel room

Tonight, we are about to leave for the Grand Ole Opry. How could we say that we had come here without visiting this iconic country show. It’s been running since 1925 and is the longest running radio music show in the world. More about that tomorrow

Music at Silky O'Sullivans

The resident band at BB Kings

In the steps of Martin Luther King Jr

Martin Luther King Jr, Assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis 1968

Sunset over the Mississippi, from our hotel room

The Lansky Story

Known to everyone as Mr B, Bernard Lansky and his brother Guy carried the title of “Clothier to the King”. Elvis was different from the start; his dress style was influenced more by what the black men were wearing than his white contemporises. Lansky’s was established on Beale Street in the 1940s and soon counted great names as customers such as BB King, Count Basie, Duke Ellington and many more. In 1952 Mr B noticed a young man who kept walking past his window and he eventually invited him in. The rest is history and it has established Lansky’s as one of the most famous men’s clothiers in the world. Lansky’s moved to the Peabody Hotel 23 years ago. Famous people come from all over the world to visit this remarkable store, as did 3 young (at heart) men this morning. We sadly missed Mr B who had not been well but his Son Hall who now runs the business welcomed us. Like everywhere in Memphis with a history, it is festooned by music memorabilia and signed guitars.

Famous travellers meet Hall Lansky

Sun Studio

6 blocks down from the Peabody is Sun records. Sam Phillips worked as a talent scout and DJ. He set up the Memphis Recording Service to record new artists. The prominent music forms of the time were Hillbilly, Gospel and Pop but Sam was a blues fan and he wanted to search out new black and white talent to bring them to public attention. No record label existed that could record this new music genre and as a result, Sam established Sun Records.

Sam recorded what is reputed to be the first ever Rock and Roll record called Rockett 88 with Ike Turner and his band. He discovered a number of fresh talents including Howlin’ Wolf, Ike Turner and BB King. All this changed when that same young man came and paid $4 to make a record supposedly for his mother’s birthday. It was not Sam who first recognised Elvis’ talent but his secretary Marian Keisker. Marion liked him and badgered Sam until he agreed to record Elvis. Sam did not want to record yet another white kid who could sing ballads. What he wanted was a white kid who could sing like a black man. It was only at the first recording session and 3 hours into the recording that Elvis and the boys played a black song called “That’s Alright Mamma”. Sam asked his friend and DJ Dewy Phillips to play it. It was an instant success. Elvis was followed by other successful acts such as Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins. Standing on that recording floor was like standing on hallowed ground. Crosses on the floor marked where Elvis and his musicians stood at that fateful recording session.

Marian Keisker's desk. The real discoverer of Elvis

The Boys singing into Elvis's original microphone. That elusive recording contract

How could 2 musicians come to Memphis and not visit the Gibson guitar factory. Tim and Hugh spent 2 hours in heaven, walking around with their tongues hanging out. I discovered the height of nerdism as Tim went around pointing at particular guitars and saying 335, 355, 175, 137……..!!!!! I was worried that Tim was thinking of buying yet another guitar, so Hugh and I confiscated his credit card and abducted him secretly through the backdoor. I was glad to get him to Rum Boogie Cafe for a beer and a cup of Gumbo in order to restore a sense of reality to him

Gibson Guitars

The Rum Boogie Cafe

Stevie Ray Vaughan's guitar at Rum Boogie. This ones for Hugh

Memphis is notorious as being one of the foci for the Civil Rights Movement. James Earl Ray assassinated Martin Luther King Jr here in 1968 at the Lorraine Motel. The National Civil Rights Museum has been built in the shell of the Lorraine Motel. We were exhausted after lunch but felt that we should visit. I am so glad that we did as it is one of the most moving museums that I have been to. A tour takes you through a time frame leading from 1690 (when the fist slaves landed in America) until now. It is hard to believe that only 50 years ago fellow human beings were seen as an inferior race and treated in an inhuman and brutal maner. I am so glad that we went. The highlight of the day.

The Lorraine Motel

The Bus from Montgomery, Alabama where Rosa Parks defied segregation laws and started a movement

The monument in the lobby of the National Human Rights Museum

The balcony on which Martin Luther King Jr was assasinated

The Boys playing at the Gibson factory. Sorry but not the right way up!!

From Delta Avenue to Beale Street

Elvis is the King

Elvis' statue at the top of Beale Street

T model Ford who was born in the1920s, is one of the last blues men who has a direct link to the original Delta Blues. He has had a long and eventful life. He was sentenced to 10 years on a chain gang for murder but only served two and only started playing the guitar at the age of 56. Listening to this 88-year-old man, I could hear the sound of the raw vibrant blues of Charley Patton and Robert Johnson mixed with the influence of the later Chicago masters. T Model played with his 12-year-old grandson on the drums. This was a remarkable feat for a lad his age. Last night was a much more sober and reserved evening. The electricity had gone and the audience was much more subdued. We were all energised for a short moment when Bilbo Walker made a brief appearance in the audience. It was still a great night and I was sad to leave Red and his Juke Joint behind for the last time as we left Clarksdale to follow the old river once more.

T "Model" Ford with his grandson at Red's

It’s rather a cliché to say that we drove into Memphis on a sunny spring Sunday morning with Elvis classics pounding out of the car stereo but we did. Suspicious minds sounds so good when you are cruising up Elvis Presley Boulevard on your way to Graceland. I had heard that Graceland was small and a bit of a disappointment. Neither of us were disillusioned, it was a great day. Only Americans can manage these venues so well and the Elvis tour was a memorable experience. Elvis was beautiful in every way. Great looking guy, great voice, generous spirit and a gentleman. This comes through during the tour. He was at heart a simple country boy who was imprisoned behind the image and lonely. You begin to sense his unhappiness in those last few years. The tour of the main house ends at the graves of Elvis and his parents. It’s a really emotional moment for most of those visiting. When I was at primary school in West Wales, you were either an Elvis fan or a Cliff fan. Please forgive me Elvis but I was part of the Cliff gang for a while.

Paying homage at Graceland

Graceland

Elvis' 1970s style

A quiet moment at the end of the tour. An emotional moment

Elvis's mothers pink Cadillac. This was his favourite car

His suit from the 1968 "Comeback TV Show"

Beale Street was the melting pot where many musical influences collided. The blues from the delta met jazz from New Orleans and poor white music (which would later be known as Country Music) Those who remember the old Beale street will tell you little remains of the original street full of juke joints and brothels. It was here that classic blues, jug bands and honky-tonk flourished. We tend to think of Chicago catalyst for Rhythm & Blues and Rock & Roll, but none of this would have happened without Memphis and Beale Street. Memphis gave us Soul Music (Stax), Rock & Roll (Sun Records) and much more but that is another story and we are off to explore that tomorrow.

A cool guy on Beale Street

Halfway down Beale is a statue of the legendary WC Handy. Handy was a band leader and composer. He is credited with discovering, composing and publishing the Blues. I had to go and thank him on behalf of many of my fellow blues enthusiasts. Thanks Mr Handy!

Saying thank you to WC Handy

Great act at Silky O'Sullivan's on Beale

There are similarities between Beale and Bourbon Streets, both streets have a buzz about them and they are full of noise and neon lights at night. Beale however doesn’t feel as relaxed as the Big Easy. We spent our evening at BB Kings Blues Club. The food was the best Southern food we have tasted so far and the music, played by their resident band was high voltage, virtuoso, Electric Texan Blues/Rhythm & Blues. We were not expecting too much but we left very satisfied and full. We have a lot to do tomorrow!

BBs Blues Bar on Beale

The resident band at BB King's

Internet connection too slow to upload any video. Sorry!

By the way, we will not be sending any postcards this time. The blog is our great BIG postcard and it gets to you before we get home.