Nashville

I started the morning with a visit the Country Music Hall of Fame . I had a choice of several levels of tickets. The most expensive, at 71.95, included the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, the Hatch Show Print Tour and the Historic RCA Studio B Tour. I chose the least expensive option, for 27.95, the museum only. Although a bit more expensive than some other music museums, it was worthwhile and a good value. This was one of the better curated exhibits. Everything was legible and clear. And the audio-video presentations were informative and of reasonable length. Yet again, it reminded me of the fluid nature of music labels and how each genre has, at least at some point, influenced or drawn from another.

In the afternoon I visited the National Museum of African American Music . This is a very new museum, opened only in 2021. Regular price adult tickets are 24.95; I paid 19.95 for a senior admission. Again, the experience was very worthwhile. They have done a great job of interweaving the history of the African American experience with the evolution of the music that accompanied it. This was the first of the music exhibits that documented Jazz, R&B, Hip-Hop and Rap - all as an evolution from gospel, soul and blues. It was also the first to show the dance forms that accompanied the music. All of this music is so rhythmic that it compels you to move; I pretty much danced my way through the museum.

Both museums get a thumbs up.

I then walked around downtown a bit more. I was intrigued enough to walk into Betty boots . They had some truly beautiful boots, but, true to form, the ones I liked were far above my budget for non-essentials this year.

Union Station , an historical railway station was recommended. It is a beautiful building, but the surrounding construction interfered with photography. I made one more attempt to find a club to listen to some music. You can hear the music from the sidewalk as all of the doors and window are open. Given that they were all too loud from the outside, I was pretty sure I would not appreciate being inside. Also, whatever they were playing, it was not classical country or even cross-over country. It was mostly unidentifiable and, to my ear anyway, not very good. I was not motivated to go in and listen. The one place I did try to enter, Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge , the bouncer at the door saw my camera and very nastily told me I was not allowed to take photos. So never mind.

I decided to just call it an early night and retire to my hotel room. I saw that an Amazon package had been delivered and went down to get it. It is worth nothing that I had already received two packages at this hotel without incident. This time, however, I was told that they wanted to charge me 10 bucks to collect the package. Mind you, the contents of the package was not worth much more than that. I’ve had plenty of packages delivered to hotels, and of course is a routine occurrence during this trip. And most of them were to Marriott properties, some of the Courtyards. I have NEVER been asked to pay to collect a package - that cost the hotel nothing to receive. That just seems usurious, kind of like the $49/night for valet parking (I chose the $20/night public parking option that was still in a covered secure location a few feet away from the hotel. While many hotels could use improvement - especially as I head east for some reason - this is the first that I will, in spite of the good location, recommend that the Marriott Courtyard Nashville downtown be avoided. Of course, in the end I did not pay the 10 bucks, all it took was some minor complaining and they “waived it as a one-time courtesy” blah blah blah.

Tomorrow I will take a drive to Knoxville to visit a friend.