Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, how D and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Speaker 1: Josh Clark. There's Charles W Chuck Bryan over there, there's
Speaker 1: Jerry Jerome Roland, and this is Stuff you should Know, folks. Yeah. Uh,
Speaker 1: Can I do a little plug right off the beginning
Speaker 1: to sort of explain why I got this idea? Yeah? Yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: because this episode is on the Grand Old Opry in Nashville, Tennessee,
Speaker 1: the longest running radio broadcast in US history, and they
Speaker 1: sent you a check. No, I gotta an email, Jesus.
Speaker 1: I feel like a long time ago from a Stuff
Speaker 1: you Should Know listener in a movie Crusher named Joseph
Speaker 1: I'm gonna pronounce it tin l t I n n
Speaker 1: e l L And he is the content and programming
Speaker 1: director of WSM Radio, which you'll learn all about that here. Uh.
Speaker 1: And he runs the show and he started at staying
Speaker 1: we kind of had some back and forth over the
Speaker 1: years about um me coming to the Rieman to see
Speaker 1: a show, and he's like, I could I haven't mentioned
Speaker 1: on Movie Crush. He said, I can get you backstage
Speaker 1: if you ever want to come to Nashville and go
Speaker 1: to a show with the Ryman, and so we've been
Speaker 1: communicating for a long time. And then this past year
Speaker 1: he started, uh, what's called the WSM Playlist, which is
Speaker 1: they turned the radio station over to someone for an
Speaker 1: hour and let them DJ and program. And he offered
Speaker 1: that to me and I did it? Wow? And when
Speaker 1: did you tell everybody about it? On stuff I'm doing
Speaker 1: right now? Oh, when is it gonna play? It is?
Speaker 1: It's you know, you record it so they can release
Speaker 1: it whenever. So you you did covers of all the
Speaker 1: songs that you wanted on the playliss I, I just DJ. Basically,
Speaker 1: It's gonna air five pm Central time, July one at
Speaker 1: five pm Central on ws M Radio Home in the
Speaker 1: Grand ol Opry. You can find it online at w
Speaker 1: s M radio dot com. Just hit the listen live button.
Speaker 1: On July one at five pm Central, we'll hear me
Speaker 1: spinning records from Uncle Tupelo and Bonnie Prince Billy and
Speaker 1: Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash. I can't remember who. Well,
Speaker 1: it's a lot of a lot of great stuff that's awesome.
Speaker 1: Did you do that thing where you like you just
Speaker 1: held the one uh like can up to your ear
Speaker 1: from the headphones. Now, I was a little nervous though,
Speaker 1: and I felt that was a little stiff and loosened
Speaker 1: up and then send it to him and I was like, hey,
Speaker 1: I feel like I didn't do great at first. And
Speaker 1: he said, yeah, you were a little stiff. And he said,
Speaker 1: why don't you redo the first We call him all
Speaker 1: these radio lingoes like ins and outs and you know,
Speaker 1: raps and things like that, because you gotta talk about
Speaker 1: the last song and then the next song. And so
Speaker 1: he let me redo the first kind of set of
Speaker 1: those and hopefully I'm a little more loose. It's always
Speaker 1: better the second take. It is. Willie Nelson's in there.
Speaker 1: I got some good stuff. That's really cool. Man, can gratulations, Chuck.
Speaker 1: I feel like you finally made it. You're a member
Speaker 1: of the Grand Old Operation. No, no, no, we'll talk
Speaker 1: all about that. That's the old deal. So um we
Speaker 1: are talking Grand Old opry. Uh. And now I'm nervous
Speaker 1: about it because the station manager is going to be listening.
Speaker 1: And by the way, this episode, what was his name,
Speaker 1: Joseph Tinnell. Joseph prepared to be disappointed criticisms. He's a
Speaker 1: stuff you should know listener and the movie Crusher two.
Speaker 1: Of course he's a nice guy. So we're talking Grand
Speaker 1: Old Opry today, and you said something that I find
Speaker 1: just fascinating that it is I don't know if you
Speaker 1: said in the world, but it is the oldest, longest
Speaker 1: running live radio broadcast program in the entire world. It's
Speaker 1: been broadcasting The Grand Old Opry, which is a radio show.
Speaker 1: A lot of people think it's it's a music venue,
Speaker 1: and it is, but really the music venue kind of
Speaker 1: grew out of the radio show. It all. It began
Speaker 1: as a radio show, um, all the way back in
Speaker 1: so it's coming pretty close to its hundredth the anniversary.
Speaker 1: And in all that time, it's only missed one Saturday
Speaker 1: night broadcast, one live Saturday night broadcast. Every other Saturday
Speaker 1: night all the way back to you could tune into
Speaker 1: WUSM Nashville AM six fifty and here the Grand Old
Speaker 1: Opry radio program, which is I mean, hats off to that.
Speaker 1: I don't care if you think country Western music is
Speaker 1: as bad as experimental smooth jazz, doesn't matter. You still
Speaker 1: have to tip your hat to that. Yeah, tip that stetson. Uh,
Speaker 1: we should tell them why that they missed that one broadcast.
Speaker 1: It was after the assassination of Martin Luther King. The
Speaker 1: city of Nashville, I think most of Tennessee probably was
Speaker 1: under curfew, so they had to rerun a program, and
Speaker 1: I think they did a live show the next day
Speaker 1: or or something during the day earlier that day before,
Speaker 1: I believe they tried to show. So they still did
Speaker 1: a show that day. They just missed the live broadcast
Speaker 1: that night, but all the other ones dating back, they
Speaker 1: made pretty neat. Yeah. I actually went um when I
Speaker 1: was a kid. We went to it was an amusement
Speaker 1: park called opry Land, USA, which is now I think
Speaker 1: sort of a shopping center mall kind of thing, but
Speaker 1: back then it was an amusement park like a country.
Speaker 1: It was pretty Dollywood. Oh you went to the opry Land, USA?
Speaker 1: Oh wow? Okay, Yeah, And so we also went to
Speaker 1: the Grand ol opry House. And I don't know if
Speaker 1: it was a Saturday show. I know they do shows
Speaker 1: on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, but um, I don't remember
Speaker 1: much about it, do But I do remember being in
Speaker 1: that building and seeing the sort of barn shaped motif stage,
Speaker 1: and that's kind of all I remember. I was probably
Speaker 1: no more than six or seven. I don't know what
Speaker 1: it is, but they're nothing more cozy than a building
Speaker 1: within a building. Yeah, you know, I definitely loved the
Speaker 1: stage for the Grand Old Opry for sure. Alright, So
Speaker 1: the Grand Old Opry started out out of indirectly out
Speaker 1: of Chicago. That was something called the National Barn Dance,
Speaker 1: which was a radio broadcast out of Chicago playing country music,
Speaker 1: uh way back in the day, and it had a
Speaker 1: really big following, but it didn't reach Nashville. So the
Speaker 1: former UM, a former DJ from there named George Hay
Speaker 1: went to Nashville became the station manager at WSM and
Speaker 1: pitched what he called, um the Barn Dance, Yeah, which
Speaker 1: was a lot like National Barn Dance. But He's like,
Speaker 1: but here's the difference. We dropped the National. Yeah. It
Speaker 1: was kind of like a proto heehaw and that they had.
Speaker 1: It was a variety show. They had music, they had dancers,
Speaker 1: they had comedy bits and sketches, um, all with that
Speaker 1: sort of country fide flavor. I almost wonder if he
Speaker 1: Hall was influenced by the Grand Old Operation, think a
Speaker 1: little bit, but it was. So it was on WSM,
Speaker 1: as you were saying that the barn Dance is what
Speaker 1: you know Grand old Opry radio program was originally called
Speaker 1: for the first couple of years, and that guy George
Speaker 1: Hay who pitched it and hosted it, had had been
Speaker 1: at that radio station in Chicago, but now he worked
Speaker 1: for WSM, which was actually an insurance company's radio station.
Speaker 1: It's a very strange story, it is, but they they
Speaker 1: were there were the headquarters in the National Life and
Speaker 1: Accident Insurance Company, headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. And I apparently
Speaker 1: one of the executives there was really into this new
Speaker 1: technology radio and I was high enough up in the
Speaker 1: company that he got the company to start broadcasting from
Speaker 1: the fifth floor UM. And so that's where that first
Speaker 1: early program was broadcast from. Was this insurance company UM
Speaker 1: headquarters like office building on Saturday nights. Yeah. And if
Speaker 1: you're wondering what w O s M stands for, because
Speaker 1: it was from the insurance company, it stands for We
Speaker 1: Shield Millions, still known as w s M. It's really funny.
Speaker 1: I tried to find out who this executive was, but
Speaker 1: I couldn't. I couldn't look at it. Yeah, that's you know,
Speaker 1: it's crazy how people can become lost to history, even
Speaker 1: though their story is just so wrapped up in something
Speaker 1: that's everywhere. All it takes is for them just getting
Speaker 1: knocked out of one, you know, one popular article and
Speaker 1: everybody else who picks up on that after that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're not coming back, you know. All right. So the
Speaker 1: Barn Dance, they had their first broadcast on November had
Speaker 1: uncle Jimmy Thompson, who was a Tennessee musician and won
Speaker 1: a fiddling competition in Texas, was a big, big hit,
Speaker 1: and within just a few months there were people literally
Speaker 1: coming down to this insurance building to watch live through
Speaker 1: the US the glass walls of the studio very cool. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all this reminds me of um oh brother or art
Speaker 1: that when they go into the recording studio. I think
Speaker 1: it's very similar to that kind of thing, right, So
Speaker 1: like they kind of knew, like, no, this is this
Speaker 1: might be a thing, like this is kind of a
Speaker 1: people are showing up, you know, in person on Saturday
Speaker 1: night at an insurance company's offices to watch this stuff.
Speaker 1: And it kind of started to take off pretty quickly.
Speaker 1: And it was I think when George Hay famously said,
Speaker 1: um about this preceding like radio or classical music Appreciation
Speaker 1: Hour that we've been listening to music largely from the
Speaker 1: Grand Opera. From now on we will present the Grand
Speaker 1: Old Opry. And apparently everybody thought that was hysterical, and
Speaker 1: that became the name of the show from that time on.
Speaker 1: I think in December of it is pretty cool, yeah,
Speaker 1: And so there were these weekly performances every Saturday, UM
Speaker 1: at the National Life and Accident Insurance Company's headquarters. But
Speaker 1: more and more people started to show up, and I
Speaker 1: saw somewhere, Chuck, I love this. It's like a full
Speaker 1: circle irony. But at the time, the leaders the of Nashville,
Speaker 1: the heads of business and UM, a lot of the
Speaker 1: other you know, the politicians, the wealthy people who are
Speaker 1: running the show in Nashville, were trying to move the
Speaker 1: city's image in the exact opposite direction of what they
Speaker 1: were doing every Saturday night at the insurance company's headquarters.
Speaker 1: Like they were trying to basically say, Nashville is not
Speaker 1: no mountain folk here, no holdowns going on here. Just
Speaker 1: we're just like every were like New York, where the
Speaker 1: New York of the middle of America. I kind of thing.
Speaker 1: And they really resented the Grand Old Opery because it
Speaker 1: was getting more and more popular. And then finally the
Speaker 1: Grand Old Opry became so powerful and such an institution
Speaker 1: in nash Fille that it in large part became the
Speaker 1: leaders of the city and it shaped Nashville. Like Nashville
Speaker 1: wasn't music city until the Grand Ole Opry came along
Speaker 1: and they were trying to take it in a different direction.
Speaker 1: The Grand ol Opry took it in that that direction
Speaker 1: of basically establishing like the headquarters of country western music.
Speaker 1: Uh and put Nashville on the map in that very
Speaker 1: legitimate way. It had three consecutive mayors killed it did
Speaker 1: to accomplish this feed that's all poisoned. Oh no, that's
Speaker 1: not true at all. People who run the Grand ol
Speaker 1: Opry that are listening right now, we wei, yeah, I
Speaker 1: do feel like someone's looking over our shoulder. All right,
Speaker 1: So you know what, let's take a break and then
Speaker 1: we'll talk about kind of the change in venues over
Speaker 1: the years and how that represents the rise of the
Speaker 1: Grand ol Opry in prominence. Right after this, all right,
Speaker 1: so you're you're throwing these hoe downs in an insurance building.
Speaker 1: It's going well, people are showing up, mayors are dropping
Speaker 1: like flies, trying to fight this thing to be big city,
Speaker 1: New York City in Tennessee. Uh. And so they said
Speaker 1: we gotta move. So they said, all right, first thing
Speaker 1: we'll do is we'll move into an actual auditorium space
Speaker 1: here in the same building. That worked for a little while.
Speaker 1: Then in thirty four they moved to the Hillsborough Theater
Speaker 1: Community Playhouse now called the Bellcourt Theater um started selling
Speaker 1: some ads, making a little dough. I think two years
Speaker 1: later they outgrew that moved to the Dixie Tabernacle, which
Speaker 1: was a religious hall um, sort of an old timmy
Speaker 1: sort of revival house, and they were there for a
Speaker 1: few years before they said, you know what, I don't
Speaker 1: like this wild audience coming in here on the drink
Speaker 1: and acting all crazy and dancing in the aisle. So
Speaker 1: get out of the Dixie Tabernacle and they moved to
Speaker 1: the War Memorial Auditorium, which is when they started selling
Speaker 1: tickets for a quarter apiece in n nine and started
Speaker 1: I think they even got um a spot on NBC.
Speaker 1: They were in a movie. Things started happening in a
Speaker 1: big way. Yeah, it was a big deal. In thirty
Speaker 1: nine when NBC started broadcasting them on the radio, uh,
Speaker 1: to a national audience. I mean, first of all, it's
Speaker 1: it's now it's national, and that certainly legitimizes it. But
Speaker 1: the fact that one of the big broadcasters at the
Speaker 1: time thought it was an important enough show to to
Speaker 1: pick it up and you know, send it out to
Speaker 1: everybody else, that's a that's a huge And this is
Speaker 1: you know, less than twenty years after it's about fifteen
Speaker 1: years after the Grand Old Opry first went on the air.
Speaker 1: That's pretty impressive stuff. Um. And then they moved on
Speaker 1: i think nineteen forty three to the Rhyman Theater, which
Speaker 1: is one of the places that the Grand Old Opery
Speaker 1: is synonymous with. Right, yeah, and that's I'm dying to
Speaker 1: go to a show there. I'll make it there at
Speaker 1: some point, hopefully get that backstage tour from Joseph. But
Speaker 1: it was it's a legendary theater. It was there for
Speaker 1: thirty years. Umye hundred seats. It's the mother Church of
Speaker 1: country music. And I think they raised the price to
Speaker 1: eighty cents there. Um. We'll talk a little bit more
Speaker 1: about how the Rymans still figures in today, but it
Speaker 1: was that's when things really I mean, if you're in
Speaker 1: the seat venue, filling it up a few times a week,
Speaker 1: that's your your big time. At that point, I think
Speaker 1: they um the regular cast what played Carnegie Hall in
Speaker 1: the forties went on tour in Europe and they were
Speaker 1: starting to birth some real sort of superstars like roy
Speaker 1: A Cuff. Yeah, and Mini Pearl came along in Yo.
Speaker 1: And she's just as closely linked to that period of
Speaker 1: the um the Grand Old Opry as roy Acuff is
Speaker 1: for sure. Um. I was reading about her, did you
Speaker 1: know that whole thing was just a total put on?
Speaker 1: That she was like a college educated woman from a
Speaker 1: well to do family. It was, it was a character.
Speaker 1: I mean, I fell for a Hooklein and sinker. She
Speaker 1: was Larry the Cable Guy. Yes, exactly, she was. She
Speaker 1: was Larry the Cable Guy prior to Larry the Cable Guy.
Speaker 1: But I was like, I know she was in a
Speaker 1: commercial that I loved when I was a kid. I
Speaker 1: was like, I think it was Spick and Span, and
Speaker 1: I looked it up and sure enough, thank you Internet,
Speaker 1: there's a two Spick and Span commercial where she shows
Speaker 1: up and shows this this lady that she can get
Speaker 1: her Linoleum floors back to looking new with spick and span.
Speaker 1: It was great. That's funny what hangs in the memory, right,
Speaker 1: it really does that. And then my other association with
Speaker 1: Mini Pearl is UM that Dead Milkman song Punk Rock
Speaker 1: Girl where they'll name their their daughter Mini Pearl. That's
Speaker 1: the other, the other Mini Pearl thing. UM. So there's
Speaker 1: a couple of ways you can get on stage and
Speaker 1: play at the Grand Old Opry Um. Most people are
Speaker 1: invited to play as a guest just on a random
Speaker 1: individual show, and that's a great, great honor. Uh. Then
Speaker 1: they have there I mentioned the cast earlier, they have
Speaker 1: what's what's called members. They're the cast. They're these regular
Speaker 1: performers who are invited to become a member UM. I
Speaker 1: think publicly. Once you're invited, an existing member will ask
Speaker 1: you to join them live on the air during a broadcast.
Speaker 1: Kind of is the big coming out party, I guess UM.
Speaker 1: And being a member is UM it's a really big deal. Like, uh,
Speaker 1: they take a lot of time to add members. They
Speaker 1: only add maybe a couple of year. There's there's I
Speaker 1: think sixty five current active members I'm sorry, sixty total,
Speaker 1: uh nine of which no longer perform or officially retired, okay,
Speaker 1: but they're still they're still considered members of their considered
Speaker 1: I think you kind of have to pass away to
Speaker 1: officially be taken off, unless you run a foul, which
Speaker 1: we'll talk about that as well. I got you. Um So, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's uh, the there's basically, I mean, to become a
Speaker 1: member of the Grand Old Opry is an enormous honor,
Speaker 1: Like it's a really big deal. There are people who,
Speaker 1: um are just huge country superstars that are not members
Speaker 1: of the Grand Old Operate. They might be invited to
Speaker 1: come play a show or something like that, but they're
Speaker 1: not members of the Grand Old Operation if you remember
Speaker 1: the Grand Old Opry. Basically, the impression I have is
Speaker 1: that you're considered the the uh the guard of country
Speaker 1: music is one way to put it in a really
Speaker 1: confusing way. Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of
Speaker 1: things that go into it, and I mean it sounds
Speaker 1: like it's you know, they talk about you being successful
Speaker 1: and you being connected it and you being committed. That's
Speaker 1: a big part of it, and we'll get to that
Speaker 1: in a second. But it sounds like there's not just
Speaker 1: sort of one set of criteria where like, hey, if
Speaker 1: you have so many number one hits or so much
Speaker 1: music sales, it's like a bunch of stuff decided by people. Yeah,
Speaker 1: subjectively and objectively, right. I think also in some cases
Speaker 1: it's a it's a judgment that's passed on your style
Speaker 1: of country music. Like they might not like it at
Speaker 1: a time. Maybe I think it sounds too poppy back
Speaker 1: in the day, they might have thought it sounded to
Speaker 1: rock and roll. Um. Like there's a there's a definite like,
Speaker 1: like you said, subjectivity to it as well as objectivity. Um.
Speaker 1: But if you if you do get that that um,
Speaker 1: that invitation, um, you're expected to come play twelve shows
Speaker 1: a year, twelve Saturday nights, I should say a year, um,
Speaker 1: to maintain your your membership. Uh. And I think also
Speaker 1: you have to sell cookies in the February to help
Speaker 1: raise funds. Is that true? No, it wouldn't surprise me. Man,
Speaker 1: that's the girls Scouts. No, it would not surprise me
Speaker 1: because they they do expect a lot of participation, and
Speaker 1: not just on show nights. They expect you to go
Speaker 1: to a lot of shows. They expect you just to
Speaker 1: kind of be there a lot. Um. I think in
Speaker 1: the fifties and sixties. Uh, they were at I mean
Speaker 1: from its inception up into the fifties and sixties, they
Speaker 1: required twenty six shows a year, which is a man,
Speaker 1: that's like half your weekend shows basically, yea tour. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if you want to go tour, that's that's a significant
Speaker 1: amount of time that you have to dedicate. And they
Speaker 1: finally knocked it down to twelve, which is still pretty significant,
Speaker 1: especially if you don't live in Nashville, but uh, it's
Speaker 1: that's much more manageable than twenty six, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they knocked it down to twenty and nineteen sixty four
Speaker 1: after they bought at six and then sixty four. It's
Speaker 1: I think in two thousand and they finally knocked it
Speaker 1: down to twelve. Oh really, it took that long. Huh,
Speaker 1: took a while. So over the years, the membership of
Speaker 1: the Grand Old Opry has been you know, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of people that that you would expect who were members,
Speaker 1: like everybody from roy A Cuff, as we said earlier
Speaker 1: in Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass, Um, Petty Kleine,
Speaker 1: Hank Williams was for a while, Johnny Cash, Barbara Mandrell, Reba.
Speaker 1: Reba's actually playing what's the date today? Do you know?
Speaker 1: Is it the twenty two? Yes, Reba's playing the Grand
Speaker 1: Old Opry tonight. Isn't that cool? I love it? And
Speaker 1: listen to you going with just the one name. Oh
Speaker 1: it's Reba we're talking about here. I watched your TV
Speaker 1: show pretty frequently, so I'm on a first name basis
Speaker 1: with her. I never saw it was a good It
Speaker 1: actually was good. She was cute. Yeah, she was a good,
Speaker 1: good actress for a non actor. She's a good act
Speaker 1: sorry for she was a good actor for a non actor. Um,
Speaker 1: and she really I think I really came to appreciate
Speaker 1: Reva first and Tremors. Oh, I loved her in that.
Speaker 1: And we can say that because we were bad actors
Speaker 1: for non actors exactly. Yes, we know, we know what
Speaker 1: we're talking about. Who else these days Randy Travis, Allison Kraus,
Speaker 1: Alan Jackson, Brad Paisley. I think Keith Urban, Darius Rucker,
Speaker 1: and Blake Shelton and most recently, the most recent edition
Speaker 1: is Lady A which used to be Lady Annabellum until
Speaker 1: the George Floyd murder and ensuing protests. They were like no,
Speaker 1: we're gonna drop in and a Bellum, which hats off
Speaker 1: to them, but they went to Lady A Um, which
Speaker 1: they're probably like this coolest, sounds good, But then the
Speaker 1: Seattle Blue singer Lady A, who's been performing for thirty years,
Speaker 1: is like, I'm not really okay with this, but I'm
Speaker 1: not sure that they're changing their name again anytime soon.
Speaker 1: That's right after you are invited to perform, now that
Speaker 1: you get your aim on the wall. And I think
Speaker 1: it was Blake Shelton who actually started the new tradition
Speaker 1: of hanging his own plaque on the wall because he
Speaker 1: was so excited. Apparently he grabbed the plaque and went
Speaker 1: and did it himself during the ceremony, which is which
Speaker 1: is fairly adorable. I think I don't know much about
Speaker 1: the guy, but I like an excitable feller. Yeah he's
Speaker 1: married to Um. Yeah, that lady that's there. He's not
Speaker 1: a Hall of Back girl. By the way, was that
Speaker 1: was that one of their songs? Yeah, that was one
Speaker 1: of her songs. I don't know B A N A
Speaker 1: N A yes, something like that. I have a rhythm.
Speaker 1: Well you sang this episode that's all I wanted, so
Speaker 1: um should we take another break? Is it time? Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's take another break and we'll talk about just how
Speaker 1: this institution has evolved over the years. Okay, Chuck, So
Speaker 1: you you mentioned how the institutions evolved over the years,
Speaker 1: and you can't really be like the the ongoing voice
Speaker 1: or foundation or home of genre of music if the
Speaker 1: genre of music keeps evolving and you don't you know,
Speaker 1: but there's like kind of this tension for the Grand
Speaker 1: Old Opry as well, because it is this institution. It
Speaker 1: can't and shouldn't just go chasing every trend. It needs
Speaker 1: to kind of wait and see see if there if
Speaker 1: you know, some change that comes along is real change,
Speaker 1: um all while protecting like the musical roots of this
Speaker 1: very proud tradition of country Western music. It's not a
Speaker 1: really enviable position should and you know, luckily they've had
Speaker 1: what seems to be a pretty good succession of members
Speaker 1: and management who have done a fairly good job of
Speaker 1: overseeing that task. Um. But being an institution, it's also
Speaker 1: been kind of ice Bergean and its movements of like change,
Speaker 1: especially when a major change comes along to music, like
Speaker 1: when rock and roll came along. Yeah, I mean, you
Speaker 1: start out as folk music and how down music and
Speaker 1: bluegrass stuff and then honky tonk stuff, and eventually the
Speaker 1: electric guitar is going to make an appearance. And they
Speaker 1: had a decision to make because drums and horns and
Speaker 1: electric guitars were all banned for many years, and I
Speaker 1: think electric guitar even was allowed before drums and horns
Speaker 1: were allowed. And all it takes is kind of one
Speaker 1: performer to break the mold for people to like it,
Speaker 1: which is key, and then for the management to say,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe we need to start letting drum sets
Speaker 1: in here, because it was that that slap bass is
Speaker 1: kind of what kept that percussive time for that kind
Speaker 1: of music for many years, and drums were just you know,
Speaker 1: it's not something they wanted in there. Yeah. Um, So
Speaker 1: you can imagine when rock and roll comes in and
Speaker 1: people like Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis come around,
Speaker 1: it's a big deal and they didn't want any part
Speaker 1: of it. I think Elvis was invited to play once,
Speaker 1: but he certainly was never invited for membership. And then
Speaker 1: Jerry Lee Lewis um he got a little revenge in
Speaker 1: that he was not treated He felt like he was
Speaker 1: sort of shunned by Nashville in the country music establishment,
Speaker 1: even though he sort of did some country western, mostly
Speaker 1: kind of blazing rock and roll piano tunes. And so
Speaker 1: when he finally played there, I think in ninety three,
Speaker 1: they said, all right, you can come and play. We're
Speaker 1: inviting you, but don't play any rock and roll. And
Speaker 1: he said, okay, just put me up on that stage,
Speaker 1: got up on the stage and said, let me tell
Speaker 1: you something about Jerry Lee Lewis, Ladies and gentlemen, I'm
Speaker 1: a rock and rolling country in Western rhythm and blues
Speaker 1: singing m f R yeah, mother lover, yes. And they
Speaker 1: did not take kindly to that. Uh. The only reason
Speaker 1: he wasn't banned is because the audience loved it. I
Speaker 1: think have you ever read The Strange and Mysterious Death
Speaker 1: of Mrs Jerry Lee Lewis from Rolling Stone In You
Speaker 1: should read it. It's very eye opening and like one
Speaker 1: of those I think it was a disgrace Land episode.
Speaker 1: I'm sure that, yeah, but it's like kind of jarring.
Speaker 1: How you know, if you're super super famous, just the
Speaker 1: different kind of treatment you get, even you know, in
Speaker 1: a in a murder investigation, you know, Yeah, I'm glad
Speaker 1: that's all changed. Yeah, I know the seventies are crazy, um,
Speaker 1: but they they the fact that they didn't kick Jerry
Speaker 1: Lee Lewis out or allowed him to come back and
Speaker 1: play some more. I don't think he was ever Um
Speaker 1: he was never a member, right, No, he was just
Speaker 1: abody to play, okay, but he was he was invited
Speaker 1: back again. Was because he rocked that place that hard, apparently,
Speaker 1: but there have been other people who were kicked out,
Speaker 1: um for far less than that, for what then what
Speaker 1: he did? Um? So there is kind of this this
Speaker 1: view from the outside of like what what what's the
Speaker 1: decision making process here? In some of these cases, some
Speaker 1: are just obvious, other ones are like I'm not sure
Speaker 1: about that one. Yeah, there was Um well, these the
Speaker 1: Birds weren't kicked out. But in the sixties with a
Speaker 1: hippie counterculture, obviously that was going to be an issue
Speaker 1: with Nashville because they had sort of a no long
Speaker 1: hair's rule. But they did invite the Birds because they
Speaker 1: were that kind of new brand of country rock and
Speaker 1: the crowd hated them. Um. So I don't think they
Speaker 1: came back, but it wasn't like they were kicked out
Speaker 1: they were were less voted out by you know, lack
Speaker 1: of popular demand. I'll bet that was not a comfortable show. No,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that didn't feel very good. But David Crosby
Speaker 1: had plenty of drugs too, right. So Hank Williams was
Speaker 1: very famously kicked out. He was a member of the
Speaker 1: Grand Old Opry Um and he was kicked out in
Speaker 1: nine two, just a few months before he died. Um.
Speaker 1: He was kicked out because he kept missing shows. So
Speaker 1: he missed two shows in one weekend because he was
Speaker 1: off drunk um and they were like you, you're just
Speaker 1: we can't have this any longer. Um, I think we
Speaker 1: should do a whole episode on him someday. Yeah, sure.
Speaker 1: I mean, anyone who kind of drinks himself to get
Speaker 1: to death before their thirties intriguing at the very least,
Speaker 1: very sad story, Yeah, agreed. And then Johnny Cash he
Speaker 1: very famous. He was kicked out of the Opery as well.
Speaker 1: He met his wife, June Carter Cash when they were performing,
Speaker 1: both of them separately at the Grand Old Opery one night,
Speaker 1: and he became a member for years until nineteen sixty
Speaker 1: five when he um went nuts and destroyed like some
Speaker 1: lighting equipment because as Mike wasn't working during a rehearsal um,
Speaker 1: which is a little diva ish, I think you could
Speaker 1: make the case. And they said, um, bite your tongue,
Speaker 1: and they said, uh that he uh, he could not
Speaker 1: be a member of the opera anymore. And they kept
Speaker 1: them that way until I think the eighties, when he
Speaker 1: was finally invited back as a member. They said, Okay,
Speaker 1: we think you've probably cooled down enough. Well, he got
Speaker 1: sober and I think saw the air of his ways
Speaker 1: and made a bunch of big changes for the better
Speaker 1: in his life. I suspect that it was when he
Speaker 1: um covered that nine inch Nail song that the Grand
Speaker 1: Ol Operay was like, this is the bomb, you can
Speaker 1: come back. That's a great great He does some great
Speaker 1: covers on those albums. Yeah, very sad stuff. I think
Speaker 1: in seventy three, the was a woman named Skeeter Davis
Speaker 1: who had that really big hit the End of the World,
Speaker 1: great song um, and she got a little political. Earlier
Speaker 1: in the day, she was at a shopping mall and
Speaker 1: saw some cops arresting some Uh. There were some church
Speaker 1: workers sort of witnessing and doing their thing at the
Speaker 1: shopping mall, which I guess you weren't allowed to do.
Speaker 1: So the cops, uh either arrested them or at least
Speaker 1: took them out of there. And she got on stage
Speaker 1: that night and said, this is something I really should share. Uh.
Speaker 1: I didn't ask our manager if I could say this,
Speaker 1: but they've arrested fifteen people just for telling people that
Speaker 1: Jesus loves them, and that really burdened my heart. She
Speaker 1: was a fourteen year member and lost her membership and
Speaker 1: was banned reinstated a few years later, but actually was
Speaker 1: it yeah, one year later, but this was I was like,
Speaker 1: why would they do that? It seems like the Grand
Speaker 1: Opera you would be way down with that message. But
Speaker 1: the cops were not happy, and the police complained, and
Speaker 1: so they had to maintain that them blue line you know,
Speaker 1: got you. They had to back the blue back the blue,
Speaker 1: that's what it is and then chuck. In two thousand one,
Speaker 1: there was a really UM I would say famous case
Speaker 1: when Nico Case was banned. She wasn't a member of
Speaker 1: the opery though I don't believe, but she was an
Speaker 1: invited UM performer, right, Yeah, she played not in the
Speaker 1: operay house. It's sort of the stepping stone is to
Speaker 1: be invited to play the party plaza outside and she
Speaker 1: was playing in the sweltering heat and asked for some water.
Speaker 1: They couldn't get it to her, asked if she could
Speaker 1: take a break. They wouldn't let her take a break,
Speaker 1: so she took her shirt off and finished the set
Speaker 1: in her bra and they banned her for life. The
Speaker 1: only person to date has been banned for life right
Speaker 1: because she showed her braw yeah, which is um, you know,
Speaker 1: I think I think she could totally turn this on
Speaker 1: them now, uh, And they would probably react pretty quickly
Speaker 1: to get her back in there and invite her if
Speaker 1: she you know, if you were like you weren't weren't
Speaker 1: taking care of a woman's health on stage or a
Speaker 1: performers health on stage by giving them, you know, letting
Speaker 1: them hydrate themselves, then I think they would be like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, yeah, yeah, so back out here quick. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And she said later in an interview that like this
Speaker 1: was not a stunt or anything, like she was about
Speaker 1: to have heat stroke and this is how she was
Speaker 1: coping with it. That she wasn't you know, trying to
Speaker 1: be cool or anything, or she said she getting kicked
Speaker 1: out of the Opery. Wasn't punk rocket, wasn't good or
Speaker 1: nothing good came of it. But she did say that
Speaker 1: they told her that she'd never played Nashville again, and
Speaker 1: she certainly has played Nashville, including at the Ryman a
Speaker 1: number of times too, which is kind of, um, good,
Speaker 1: good comeback. Yeah. I actually just bought tickets to go
Speaker 1: see her in uh, the wine country in California in August,
Speaker 1: did a winery, very chic. Cannot wait. I can imagine
Speaker 1: she's one of my favorites. I've seen her a bunch
Speaker 1: of times. It'll probably be a nice small show. Huh. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's like, you know, outdoors of the winery, sipping wine,
Speaker 1: listening the cocase. That's awesome. Uh really can't wait. But
Speaker 1: she's you know, she has a reputation for sort of
Speaker 1: that outsider sort of punk rock attitude, and I think
Speaker 1: that's why they thought. Some people might have thought she
Speaker 1: was trying to just stick it to the Grand Old
Speaker 1: Opry and she's like, no, that's not the case. So
Speaker 1: we mentioned the Rieman, and obviously the Rieman's still around. Um,
Speaker 1: but the Grand Old Opry moved from the Rheman in
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy four, right, and to um this this new venue,
Speaker 1: the Grand Old Opry House that it's still in today.
Speaker 1: And it was a big deal when they moved because
Speaker 1: they've been in the Rheman for like thirty years. They
Speaker 1: started to hit like their peak of their popularity, which
Speaker 1: is plateaued really high since that time. UM. And they
Speaker 1: had their last show in March of nineteen seventy four.
Speaker 1: And I read this really great article from the New
Speaker 1: York Times of All Things UM from nineteen seventy four
Speaker 1: by Suzanne Freeman. It's called opry Land is a Dream
Speaker 1: to believe in and it's about, you know, the Grand
Speaker 1: Old Opry and what it meant to her growing up
Speaker 1: as a kid in Pennsylvania and UM, how she ended
Speaker 1: up going to this last show and what it was like. UM.
Speaker 1: But as they moved to the opery Land, one of
Speaker 1: the reasons they moved was because of this amusement park.
Speaker 1: It was a radio show that started out playing Hodowns
Speaker 1: in the headquarters of an insurance building in Nashville, now
Speaker 1: had its own Disney design theme park built in and
Speaker 1: this huge person cushioned seat, air conditioned venue UM to
Speaker 1: to basically celebrate the how far this this thing had come.
Speaker 1: It was pretty amazing. Um doubled almost doubled in size
Speaker 1: from the Rieman. Uh, and they took a little bit
Speaker 1: of the tradition with them. They cut out the six
Speaker 1: ft circle they're at center stage with the artist performs
Speaker 1: from the Riemans floorboards, moved it over to the Grand
Speaker 1: Old Opry. How us opened it big with Richard Nixon
Speaker 1: on March four, who performed. He actually played the dulcimer
Speaker 1: in the piano, sang Happy Birthday to his wife. The
Speaker 1: Rheman very sadly fell on hard times after that and
Speaker 1: hard to believe, but kind of like our our fabulous
Speaker 1: Fox Theater here in Atlanta was actually being talked about
Speaker 1: being demolished in the seventies and the eighties, and they were,
Speaker 1: like the Fox, a lot of fundraisers and a lot
Speaker 1: of people getting involved to save the Rieman. And now it's,
Speaker 1: you know, one of the oldest and still one of
Speaker 1: the most premier venues which still hosts the Grand ol
Speaker 1: Opery from November to January every year. They hold it
Speaker 1: at the Rieman. Okay, that's pretty cool, and it's called
Speaker 1: Opery at the Rieman, but it's still the Grand ol
Speaker 1: Opry every Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday, February through October. It's
Speaker 1: still at the Grand ol Opry House. And um, yeah,
Speaker 1: they don't miss those shows. Man. There was a flood.
Speaker 1: Cumberland River flooded in two thousand ten. Yeah, and uh,
Speaker 1: it really damaged. Like they had to do a lot
Speaker 1: of repairs. They even had to pull out that center
Speaker 1: circle and that was really damaged and they restored that,
Speaker 1: got it going again and kept that traditional alive. So
Speaker 1: one of the things about the amusement park that I
Speaker 1: was looking up is that it was closed in and
Speaker 1: I was reading an article about it where they were
Speaker 1: saying like it was just a bad decision that this
Speaker 1: thing was closed, because this amusement park was lucrative. Basically
Speaker 1: from the day it was opened to the day it
Speaker 1: was closed, it made money. It wasn't ever, it wasn't
Speaker 1: underwater until that flood. Um, but it was replaced in
Speaker 1: ninety seven by a mega mall, and even in people
Speaker 1: knew malls were starting to go away. So that was
Speaker 1: a really bad move to begin with. And then I
Speaker 1: found out the person who ran UM, the company that
Speaker 1: owned the amusement park, also at the same time decided
Speaker 1: that it would be best for their company to start
Speaker 1: ordering the market on online Christian music websites during the
Speaker 1: height of the dot com bubble, just before it burst.
Speaker 1: And um, this was the same person that decided to
Speaker 1: to shut down opery Land USA and replace it with
Speaker 1: them all. So it was not not one of the
Speaker 1: great decisions of all time. But I thought this that
Speaker 1: was super interesting, that it was fine. It just was
Speaker 1: taken away from everybody. Luckily there's still Dollywood, so don't panic. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean Dolly partner smart. She started playing the Grand
Speaker 1: ol Opry when she was ten years old. She saw
Speaker 1: the riding on the wall with opery Land, and UH said,
Speaker 1: why don't I start my own uh amusement country music
Speaker 1: amusement park. And I don't know if that helped drive
Speaker 1: opery Land out of business or I guess you said
Speaker 1: they were still doing okay, But yeah, no, it was good.
Speaker 1: I saw another there was another article that basically said
Speaker 1: the um opery Land made more money than Dollywood. It's
Speaker 1: last like month in exist since Wow, yeah, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: have it was just a bad move. How old I
Speaker 1: was when I we took that trip. That was us
Speaker 1: going to apry Land, the Grand all Opry House, doing
Speaker 1: that stuff. That was a quintessential Bryant family vacation in
Speaker 1: the nineteen seventies. That's awesome. Your dad was just see
Speaker 1: being with people the whole time, totally see being with people.
Speaker 1: We probably camped because I know he didn't stay in
Speaker 1: a hotel because I've literally never stayed in a hotel
Speaker 1: with my family before. Uh yeah, dude, I didn't stay
Speaker 1: in a hotel till I was except for like church trips,
Speaker 1: till I was like out of college. You were like
Speaker 1: tiny shampoo. It was weird, like they give you this stuff.
Speaker 1: It's funny, man. I love the Chuck Bryant saga. You know,
Speaker 1: it's interesting and not too far from years. I think
Speaker 1: it's something about growing up in that time period. That's uh.
Speaker 1: We we have some common DNA. Yeah, I stayed in
Speaker 1: hotels though we had hotels. Well yeah, the street we
Speaker 1: were camping campers, and we were also, Uh, I didn't
Speaker 1: have a ton of money and we're also kind of cheap.
Speaker 1: I got you, I got you all those things combined
Speaker 1: to enter the campground. Um, what else? You got anything else?
Speaker 1: On Grand Old Opry And I got nothing else? Just
Speaker 1: check out my w S and playlist hour July one,
Speaker 1: five pm Central. Very nice and hopefully this, uh it
Speaker 1: fattened up the WSM people to get you that backstage
Speaker 1: tour of the Rheyman, Yeah, eman, he even mentioned doing
Speaker 1: introductions at the Opery House, and I was like, dude,
Speaker 1: come on, wow, Like you don't want to confuse and
Speaker 1: repulse the fine people of Nashville, So okay, you don't
Speaker 1: have anything else about the Opery. I don't have anything
Speaker 1: else about the Opry. I would say, go forth and
Speaker 1: listen to the Grand Old Operate. It's still broadcast. Um,
Speaker 1: this is how cutting edge it is. It's now on YouTube.
Speaker 1: But you can also go listen to WSM online every
Speaker 1: Saturday night. And uh, they probably broadcast the Tuesday and
Speaker 1: Friday night ones too, but definitely Saturday. And since I
Speaker 1: said definitely Saturday, it's time for a listener mail. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna call this nearly corrected but not Oh I know
Speaker 1: this one. Hey guys, I'm Sean. I'm a Chinese dude
Speaker 1: living in Milan, Italy. Uh, and I just listened to
Speaker 1: short stuff Chinatown, interesting and informative. And by the way,
Speaker 1: I picked this one because at another listener right in
Speaker 1: it was not too kind about this correction, and it
Speaker 1: turns out I was right. So that's why I'm reading it.
Speaker 1: Probably because of the different pronunciations in Mandarin, Chinese, which
Speaker 1: I speak, Cantonese Chinese, and English. I thought Chuck was
Speaker 1: wrong wen you mentioned the first formally recognized Chinatown was
Speaker 1: called Little Canton at the time, and then today Canton
Speaker 1: is known as Little Gong Jao. Okay, so that Gong
Speaker 1: Joo is that it? I know I said it correctly
Speaker 1: the first time, but I looked it up recently. So
Speaker 1: just whatever I said the first time, I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: it was Gong Joongong Joe Man. I hope it is going,
Speaker 1: but go ahead. What matters is that you got it
Speaker 1: the first time, yeah, and screwed it up the second time.
Speaker 1: That's what Billy Joel always says. Get it right the
Speaker 1: first time. That's the main thing. Okay, He's somebody to
Speaker 1: model to follow, base your life on. So I mean, man,
Speaker 1: why are you bagging on Billy Joel? Hey? I know
Speaker 1: the music man, but um piano man, I think I
Speaker 1: should have stopped talking about five minutes ago, Okay. So
Speaker 1: immediately started writing a Haha, you're wrong email to point
Speaker 1: out that Chuck was wrong, but after finishing, right before
Speaker 1: clicking Cind, I had a gut feeling I should do
Speaker 1: a little bit more research. Luckily I did. It turned
Speaker 1: out the joke is actually on me. I was wrong
Speaker 1: and Chuck was right all along. So thank you much, Uh,
Speaker 1: Sir Chuck and Sir Josh, you two American gentleman taught
Speaker 1: a Chinese boy lesson about his own country. Because, by
Speaker 1: the way, Josh, you pronounced it super accurately. This is
Speaker 1: how you pronounce it, Guang Jao, Guang Jo, good job.
Speaker 1: Thank you. One last secret before finishing the email, I
Speaker 1: don't like wearing headsets nor earphones. I always play podcast
Speaker 1: on my Google Home when I am cooking eating twing dishes.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's so noisy when I'm cooking and doing dishes
Speaker 1: that I can't hear it very well. So your show
Speaker 1: is one of only two podcasts that I actually listened
Speaker 1: to with headsets that I don't like. I don't want
Speaker 1: to miss anything. High praise. The other one is Crime
Speaker 1: Junkie Okay, Hi praise indeed, yeah, we'll take it. Uh.
Speaker 1: And that is sincerely your big if not biggest Chinese fan,
Speaker 1: Sean Sean. Thank you very much, Sean. I appreciate that,
Speaker 1: and I think it's pretty sweet that you wrote into
Speaker 1: not correct us, especially when somebody was mean to Chuck Gosh.
Speaker 1: I don't know how that one slipped past me. You know. Um, Well,
Speaker 1: if you want to get in touch with us and
Speaker 1: be nice, even if it is a correction, you don't
Speaker 1: have to be a jerk about it. You can wrap
Speaker 1: it up, spank it on the bottom, and send it
Speaker 1: off to Stuff podcast at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff
Speaker 1: you should know it is production of I heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the i heart
Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
Speaker 1: favorite shows. H M.