Nashville, the Music City, is back on song

Taking flight

Tennessee’s capital has long been a party getaway for North Americans, and it’s a spiritual home for country music fans the world over, but it’s still a destination on the rise. According to the tourist board, the city’s international visitor numbers have nearly tripled in the past 10 years.

When British Airways debuted Heathrow to Nashville in 2018, it quickly became the airline’s most successful US market launch in a decade, with British arrivals leaping 83%, from 20,285 to 37,123 in the first year of the direct service.

“The UK is our top overseas market. We can’t overstate the importance of having a non-stop flight from London for our growth as a destination,” says Deana Ivey, president of Nashville Convention & Visitors Corporation.

“UK arrivals are projected to return to 50% of pre-pandemic levels by the end of 2022 and be back to 2019’s high point by 2023.”

The Music City is set for a summer of celebration, with 2022 marking big anniversaries. It’s the 130th of major venue the Ryman Auditorium, the 65th of RCA Studio B, the 55th of the Country Music Hall of Fame, and the Bluebird Cafe’s 40th. 

New luxury hotel openings, including the Conrad Nashville, Four Seasons, and Soho House’s latest addition in the artsy Wedgewood- Houston neighbourhood, are also driving an increase in affluent travellers.

“We’ve changed our State bird from the mockingbird to the crane, that’s how quickly the buildings are going up around here,” jokes Debbie Malatino, a tour guide for the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, as she takes me around the legendary RCA Studio B where Elvis recorded more than 200 songs.

Today you can still see the blue cross on the floor that marks the “sweet spot” for recording vocals, and have your picture at The King’s favourite piano. The attraction is set to become even more popular in the wake of Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis biopic.

Changing faces

The mix of old and new in the city is obvious when I visit a neighbourhood known as The Gulch. Here, The Station Inn, which has hosted live bluegrass and classic country music for over 40 years, is surrounded by trendy cafes and, since August 2021, towered over by the gleaming W Nashville.

However, as he shows me its light and airy lounge areas, the W’s general manager David Cronin concedes: “This opulence isn’t what Nashville is about. It’s places like the Station Inn and [fellow historic venue] The Bluebird Cafe that made Nashville what it is.”

Besides the five-star hotels, new and existing design-led properties, such as the Hutton Hotel near Music Row in midtown, are drawing a broader range of travellers. Local demographics are changing too as people move from less affordable cities.

My new young guitarist friend Joseph, elaborately bearded and with his head permanently wrapped in a bandana, moved from Chicago. I met him working in the Assembly Food Hall, which is part of the brand-new Fifth + Broadway development that brings together shopping, dining, and cultural attractions, including the National Museum of African American Music (NMAAM).

Opened in January 2021, it has exhibits spanning genres from gospel to hip-hop, which explore the enormous impact that black musicians have had on popular music. In Nashville you can hear it in the songs played onstage at the historic Ryman Auditorium, and in front of live audiences at the Grand Ole Opry – home of the longest-running radio broadcast in US history.

Without the banjos and rhythmic influences of African music mixing with the fiddles and balladry of immigrants from the British Isles, country music would never have been born.

Nashville itself is going through a similar rebirth: while the things that made the city great remain, new influences are set to make it more popular with travellers than ever.