A Tale of Two Cities

Memphis and Nashville, two cities in Tennessee both known for their musical roots. Memphis for the blues, Nashville for country.  They are only three hours apart by car on a major highway, similar in population but worlds apart in many other ways. I naively assumed before my recent visit there that they would be similar in feel just with different music. I did research on places to visit, hotels and restaurants and what to expect for weather but not on the demographics of the cities or their current state of affairs. I knew that Nashville was a huge tourist draw due to the popularity of country music, further enhanced by the popularity of the TV show Nashville but I knew very little about Memphis. My husband and I booked the trip and off we went to find out about Tennessee.

 We had a late night flight into Nashville and then rented a car the next day and drove to Memphis, arriving before dinnertime.  I had earlier looked into restaurants for dinner that Saturday night that might be on the cutting edge of the food scene in Memphis and couldn't find much right downtown so we headed to one about fifteen minutes away. The restaurant was quite new and funky, busy on a Saturday but not packed. When our waitress found out we were from Vancouver she stared at us in disbelief and asked sincerely why we would have come to Memphis. She lived there and didn't see its appeal. She went on to tell us that the neighbourhood we were in was on the edge of a revival but that it wasn't quite there yet. It was a gritty neighbourhood called Binghampton with a bad sense of self esteem but it was improving she assured us. Okay, then, no strolling the 'hood after dinner. We had already been warned by others who had lived in Memphis not to wander out of the tourist zone as it wasn't safe. Duly noted.

Beale Street at the corner of BB King Blvd,
Memphis

 Beale Street on a warm Saturday night is alive and kicking so we headed there. Three blocks of bars and restaurants downtown are turned into a pedestrian zone every evening with police cars parked at the ends and on the side streets. There is a strong and visible police presence in Memphis. The street scene was loud, busy, full of locals and tourists ambling up and down, dropping into bars to listen and drink, moving on and checking out the next one. Fun, crazy, entertaining.

The Civil Rights Museum was our main stop the next day. It is built around the preserved front of the Lorraine Motel where Dr. Martin Luther King was shot and the room he stayed in is part of the museum tour. The museum is large, very well set up and sobering. It was information overload but we came out with a much better understanding of the Civil Rights movement and the role Memphis has played in it.  Memphis is about 64% black or African American and civil rights is an important part of the culture and history.... as is BBQ and fried chicken which we happily indulged in as antidote to the numbing story of slavery and oppression.

The following day we drove out to tour Graceland, Elvis's home. A ten minute drive away and another world apart. The visitors and staff there are largely white. It's billed as a "mansion" and I'd say that was overstating things. I'm not a huge Elvis fan but grew up with his music on the radio and his movies on TV so I could connect to what I was I seeing and hearing as I toured the house aided by the pre-programmed iPad and headphones I was given. The Elvis of Graceland is whitewashed and perfect and there is no mention of how he died and the toll his lifestyle and fame took on him. The bathroom where he died is obviously not on the tour, but he is a piece of Memphis history and it was worth seeing.

The Tiki style of the jungle room at
Graceland

Sunday and Monday evenings on Beale Street show another side the city. Some of the bars and clubs are closed, the crowds thin out, the tawdriness shows. We got treated to a young man projectile vomiting as he walked down the middle of the nearly empty street. He didn't miss a step but we on the sidewalk did! During the daytime the downtown core of Memphis feels empty, there is little traffic or pedestrians and some areas we walked through were filled with boarded up warehouses and buildings, weeds growing everywhere. The whole city felt depressed and struggling. It was time to move on.

We drove back to Nashville on the I-40 happy to have experienced Memphis but looking forward to something more upbeat. Nashville didn't disappoint. Compared to Memphis, Nashville was shockingly white. There are approx 28% black or African Americans in the city which makes perfect sense as blues music for which Memphis is famous has its roots in African American culture but country music is largely the domain of Caucasians. Quick, name five black country singers! 

Downtown Nashville was always crammed with people and vehicles, rush hour was busy every day and the honkytonks of Broadway provided live music every night. The musicians are mostly white, the crowd is mostly young and everything is incredibly loud.

Robert's Western World in
Nashville

Speakers  point out to the sidewalks on Broadway so the live music inside can compete with the live music being performed outside by the buskers.  One Uber driver told us there were eighty cranes operating in Nashville currently, putting up buildings as fast as they can to accommodate the steady daily increase in the population. Everyone wants to be a Nashville Cat, strumming a guitar and waiting for stardom. Another driver told us he had lived there a month and just signed a recording contract. Not giving up his day job just yet though.

 We toured the famous Ryman Auditorium, the Country Music Hall of Fame Museum and the Belle Meade Plantation among other things. We dined in upscale foods restaurants, stood in line for an hour for Hattie B's Hot Chicken and sipped red wine while watching country burlesque at Skull's Rainbow Room. On our last evening in Nashville we got tickets to a small club where most of the cast from the Nashville TV show were performing to raise money for a charity. All of that was great, informative, fun and tasty. I always felt safe and was impressed with Nashville. 

This is as close as I will get to being
on the stage at the Ryman.

When I look back at the week in Tennessee the two things that stood out for me belonged to Memphis. The Civil Rights Museum and Graceland. Two sides of a very odd coin but as Memphis as it gets. So while Nashville is like the big-breasted gal with the huge smile out to break as many hearts as she can, Memphis is the quiet, troubled one, staring off into the Mississippi River, sharing her stories with whomever will stop by to listen.