Nashville’s music industry — a massive driver that contributes $5.5 billion to the local economy, for a total output of $9.7 billion in the Nashville area, according to a 2013 Cluster Analysis conducted by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce — began its ascent in the 1950s and ’60s. Surely Nashville’s commercial architecture from country music’s early period incorporated some of the era’s prevailing mid-century modernist design aesthetic, right?
Zero to 180’s latest archaeological quest, therefore, seeks to uncover Nashville music industry’s mid-century modernist past, architecturally speaking.
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Country Music Hall of Fame & Museum
Renderings of the original structure
“designed with effective simplicity“
Opened April 1, 1967
Excerpt from Billboard’s ‘World of Country’ issue —
The Country Music Hall of Fame, an idea born five years ago, becomes a reality this year when the modern, barn shaped structure opens its doors to the public. Conceived by the Country Music Foundation in 1961, the Hall of Fame and Museum will serve as a permanent educational and tourist center, housing the “sight and sound” of country music.
Located on the corner of 16th Avenue South and Division Street, at the entrance to “Music Row,” the Hall of Fame and Museum is perfectly situated to capture the attention of visitors to Nashville’s music center. Leading up to the ultramodern building is the impressive “Walkway of the Stars.” Brass emblems embedded in concrete blocks will salute the achievements of country music stars, past and present.
Inside the building, which was designed and built by W. B. Cambron of Nashville, will be housed a unique library of films, tapes and publications, The three living members of the Country Music Hall of Fame, left’ to right, Roy Acuff, Ernest Tubb and Tex Ritter, with a research section containing material from the John K. Edwards Memorial Foundation, previously on display at UCLA’s Folklore and Mythology Center.
In the right wing, a 50-seat country music theater will show films on the history of country music and video tapes of performances by noted artists. The theater will be a regular stop on the tours of the Hall of Fame and Museum.
Jenter Exhibits, Mount Vernon, N. Y., has designed the interior of the building to showcase the “sight and sound” theme. One section will be devoted to the composition of a song, depicting the step-by-step (song -building) process, in which each instrument is brought into play separately until the song is complete.
Across the hall, the “Artists Gallery” will feature up-to-the-minute information on country music performers fed through individual earphones in front of the artist’s picture.
UK‘s Keith Manifold
“whose portals lead to the immortals“
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According to The Tennessean‘s March 26, 1967 edition, Country Music Association Executive Director, Jo Walker, recalls “a Hall of Fame Committee was appointed by the CMA Board of Directors, and this committee made its first report on plans for the building in May, 1961.” In 1964, CMA’s Board of Directors created the Country Music Foundation, notes The Tennesseean, “and it was this organization that undertook the job of building and financing the Hall of Fame and Museum.”
Billboard‘s April 3, 1971 issue includes a center-section celebration of the Country Music Hall of Fame (“it might have been a pavilion at the [1964] New York World’s Fair”) that points the finger of responsibility at Frances Preston (“one of the initial spearheads for the construction of this mecca”) for the museum’s unqualified success. BMI’s vice-president and Country Music Association board member also served as chair of the original building committee.
The original Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum — after a series of building expansions in 1974, 1977, and 1984 — would close its doors at the end of 1999 and reopen in a more accessible space in Nashville’s arts and entertainment district on Rep. John Lewis Way South (4th Avenue) in 2001.
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ASCAP’s Nashville Office
image from Nashville Public Library collection
Text from the Nashville Public Library —
An exterior view of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) building located at the corner of 17th Avenue S and Division Street in Nashville, Tennessee. This structure was constructed circa 1969; the 1970 City Directory lists Edward J. Shea, Executive Regional Director for Nashville, ASCAP. The entity is the oldest performing rights organization in the U.S. founded in New York City in 1914 by a visionary group of songwriters including Victor Herbert and Irving Berlin. The not-for-profit organization operates offices in Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami Beach, Nashville, and New York.
ASCAP Nashville –
viewed from the parking lot’s opposite side
(image courtesy of The Tennessean)
As reported in Billboard‘s October 12, 1968 edition —
The massive building will replace three existing structures at 17th Avenue and Division Street, at the head of Music Row. It will face both 17th and the soon to be constructed Music City Boulevard, which in turn will replace 16th Avenue.
Construction is being done by W. B. Cambron, who also was the contractor for the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, and for the BMI building. All three of these structures now will be in close proximity.
Among other things, the building will house an executive office for [ASCAP’s regional manager, Ed] Shea, an office for Nashville manager Juanita Jones [celebrated here in 2023], other offices, and a press relations room which will include telephones, typewriters and a secretary at the disposal of newsmen.
Both the land and the building are owned by Chet Atkins and Owen Bradley, and will be leased to ASCAP on a long-term basis. It will be built to exact specifications for the performing rights society, and will contain a board of director’s room.
Between the years 1963 and 1970, “ASCAP increased its membership from only a few writers to nearly 500 writers and 100 publishers,” noted Billboard in its “Nashville Spotlight” special edition published in April of 1970. ASCAP’s first Nashville office, originally located at 1818 West End, initially operated with a staff of just two: membership director, Juanita Jones, and Asa Bush, director of licensing. The 1969 opening of its new offices would allow ASCAP to hold its first ever board meeting in Nashville.
ASCAP’s Nashville office is no longer located at 17th Avenue South and Division Street, though it is a very short walk over to the “new” ASCAP building at 2 Music Square West, which opened in 1992 [that same year, ASCAP had hosted a “unique” fundraiser benefitting the Tennessee School for the Blind in which (blind) ASCAP songwriter, John Jarrard, rappelled down the side of the 60-foot building, having already secured donation pledges from music industry colleagues on a “per foot” basis].
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BMI’s Nashville Office
Architect’s drawing
Cash Box – Nov. 2, 1963
Groundbreaking for Broadcast Music Inc.‘s Nashville building at 710 16th Avenue South took place in November of 1963, and by the following November, construction had already been completed, as reported in The Tennessean. “The austere facade is trimmed with painted wooden trusses and canopy, back and front, which shelter the two glass walls of the lobby,” noted Clara Hieronymus in The Tennessean‘s November 15, 1964 edition, with the building’s trim “basically charcoal warmed with a tone taken from the predominant brick color, and painstakingly worked out by Bill Cambron, the building’s designer and construction contractor.”
The new building’s interior design was overseen by Frances Preston, BMI’s vice president in charge of the Nashville office, in collaboration with Lewis Burton, acting director of Austin Peay State College’s art department, we are informed by Hieronymous (who also believed Preston’s office to be the most attractive office in Nashville “or anywhere”).
“We can also take cognizance of the efforts of the performance rights societies, notably BMI, in recognizing country music and encouraging it.” – Paul Ackerman, from Billboard‘s ‘World of Country Music’ 1965 special edition.
BMI’s Frances Preston (1965) —
“Without doubt American country music will continue to be heard over an ever widening range of cities and countries. Country music has already enjoyed the test of time and proved itself firmly entrenched in the hearts of simple and sophisticated devotees all over the world. The powerful nucleus of genuine feeling expressed by the traditional writers and singers of country music will never be dissipated. The ordinary man will always need to sing of this joy, pain and sadness. I have no hesitation in predicting that through country music he will do this forever.”
BMI’s Nashville Office
Billboard – Oct. 28, 1967
One of Music Row’s first “beauty” buildings, says Billboard
Within the space of eight years after locating in Nashville, notes Hieronymous, BMI would serve “some 97 per cent of this city’s music publishers and writers.” Of the three major performing rights organizations — ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC — BMI was the first to establish a brick-and-mortar presence in Nashville (1958), and its first annual Country Awards in 1953 was the first time Nashville’s country artists had been honored with an awards program by any organization, points out architectural historians, Robbie D. Jones and Carolyn Brackett (see end of piece).
Nashville Public Library informs me that BMI’s “new” 140,000 square foot building at 10 Music Square East, which opened in October 1995, incorporates a portion of the older building.
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RCA Victor’s Nashville Studios
Billboard
Apr. 3, 1965
“Victor’s New Nashville Studio Opens This Week“
Music Business
Excerpt –
Brass from the Hollywood and Nashville offices, of course, will be there, including the man in charge of Victor’s Nashville recording division, Chet Atkins and his entire staff. Victor has invited over 300 people to this grand opening, including artists, publishers, and representatives of many other record labels, all of whom are expected to use the new studios in Music City. According to all reports, the new studios are the most modern in the South, and they will be ready for business starting Tuesday, March 30, the day after the christening.
Middle Tennessee State University‘s Center for Historic Preservation provides these historical notes about RCA’s Studio A (pictured above) in its Southern Places database:
The RCA Victor Studios Building was built in 1964-65 along Nashville’s Music Row by W.B. Cambron and Company at the urging of Chet Atkins and brothers Owen and Harold Bradley. Studio A, inside the building, is a large rectangle that is virtually in tact from it’s original construction date. The room measures 75′ x 45′ x 25′ and is three stories high. A control room abuts the studio. Several musicians, including The Monkees, Joe Cocker, Leon Russell, Waylon Jennings, Dolly Parton, Tony Bennett, George Strait, The Beach Boys, William Shatner, George Jones, Jewel, and Willie Nelson, have recorded at the studio.
We know from photos of the March 29, 1965 opening event that Eddy Arnold, Al Hirt, Connie Smith, and (CMA Executive Director) Jo Walker celebrated the launch of the new 95,000 cubic foot studio with Chet Atkins, while just outside the building, a group of protesters held signs that announced displeasure at the use of non-union labor by W.B. Cambron & Co. At the studio opening event, RCA vice president, George Marek, would tell those assembled, “This studio is equal in beauty, modernity, and technological advance to any recording facility in the world.”
Studio A, unfortunately, languished in recent years, and in 2014 it was announced that the building would be sold to a developer. Musician and “anchor tenant” Ben Folds, who had been leasing the studio for the past 12 years, responded to the news of the pending sale with an open letter to the City of Nashville that advocated for preservation. Folds’ “Save Studio A” effort — which later evolved into Save Music Row — resulted in the formation of a partnership, led by three prominent citizens, Mike Curb, Aubrey Preston, and Chuck Elcan, who purchased the studio property for $5.6 million in late 2014 for the purposes of historic preservation (see Tony Gonzalez and Nate Rau‘s March 28, 2015 feature piece for The Tennesseean, “Revolution and Rebirth at Studio A“).
RCA Victor Studio A
Google photo (2014)
On the eve of the wrecking ball
Google photo (2018)
Saved by philanthropy
Prior to the construction of RCA Victor’s Studio A at 17th Avenue South, Don Maddox had constructed a masonry studio in 1957 on an adjacent parcel where 17th Avenue intersects with (the former) Hawkins Street, just a block or so away from the Bradleys’ Quonset Hut studio (believed to be the first Nashville studio to use a live echo chamber and acoustical carpeting). Maddox built the studio according to plans drawn by William Miltenburg, RCA Victor’s Chief Engineer and Manager of Recording.
Later known as RCA Victor Studio B, it is estimated that 35,000 recording sessions took place at this storied facility between the years 1957 and 1977.
RCA Victor’s Studio B
decorative brick + pattern block
exterior was once a golden mustard color
“first modern purpose-built music recording studio in Nashville“
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An article in the November 16, 1957 issue of Cash Box would note that the new studio “of modern design” had been outfitted “with the latest in recording equipment” and conceived with special attention toward acoustical optimization. Some of the studio’s up-to-date aspects include —
- Stereophonic and monaural recording
- Extensive use of perforated transite, acoustical tile, and fiberglass to eliminate low and high frequency reverberation problems
- 12-microphone, two-channel mixer console with built-in automatic gain reduction and facilities for adding echo and equalization to each microphone position
- Ability to to mike each orchestra section individually and incorporate reverberation and equalization to each section without affecting other sections of the orchestra
- Scully lathe and Westrex feedback cutter for cutting high-quality 45 RPM reference lacquers.
RCA’s famed Studio B not only still stands today at Music Square West (i.e., 17th Avenue S) and Roy Acuff Place (formerly Hawkins Street) but is a popular music heritage destination that also serves as a “classroom” for Nashville-area students who visit the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. This studio facility is still used, from time to time, by recording artists, including Marty Stuart, Bobby Bare, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings, and John Hiatt with the Jerry Douglas Band.
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Columbia Recording Studios – Nashville
Dedicated in 1965
Edwin A. Keeble‘s architectural rendering of Columbia’s new Nashville recording facility located at 804 16th Avenue South shows the three-story studio in the rear, with offices to the right. Keeble cleverly engineered the studio’s “floating floor” to keep outside vibrations from interfering with the recording process.
architectural conception
in the flesh
decorative brick textures
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Columbia’s main recording room — 58 ft. long, 37 ft. wide, 25 ft. high — was considerable in size, though smaller than RCA Victor’s main studio. Billboard‘s April 20, 1963 edition would report that Columbia was investing $100,000 into designing and building a new two-story office building that would adjoin the present recording facility — i.e., the former Bradley Film & Recording Studio (originally a house) and its “Quonset Hut Studio” located immediately behind (i.e., “Studio B“), which had been sold to Columbia in 1962. The new office building was to include two editing rooms, two mastering rooms, an echo chamber, a musicians lounge, and an engineering room; phase two of the project would focus on the three-story “Studio A.”
The Tennessean‘s Pat Welch would report in the February 17, 1966 edition how pleased Bob Dylan was with his recent experience recording at Columbia’s new studio and how eager the pioneering iconoclastic songwriter was to return to Nashville. This 1966 full-page ad features an impressive roll call of musical talent who had recorded at Columbia’s Nashville studio since the facility opened its doors the previous year.
You can find other photos of Columbia’s Nashville facility on Discogs, including this interior shot (below) that shows the use of wooden shingles to adorn the recording booths inside the main studio room.
Billboard would note in 1970 that Columbia’s Studio B facility — the “old quonset hut in which Owen Bradley and the late Paul Cohen turned out hits in the 1950s” — was Nashville’s oldest studio at that time. By 1982, unfortunately, Columbia would cease recording operations in the former Bradley Recording Studios. However, in the early part of the new century, producer/philanthropist Mike Curb would reactivate the original Quonset Hut studio for use by Belmont University students attending the Curb College of Entertainment and Music Business [see also: .Mike Curb conversing with Billboard‘s Phyllis Stark in 2005 about Nashville music history and preservation].
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Woodland Sound Studios
Billboard
1011 Woodland Street
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Glenn Snoddy, the Nashville studio owner who (accidentally) brought “fuzz tone” to rock via his Maestro fuzz pedal, retrofitted a movie theater into a sound recording facility that opened its doors in 1967. Two years later, The Tennessean‘s Jack Hurst would be reporting that Snoddy was already planning to double the studio’s capacity by building an additional complex immediately adjacent to the original structure. According to Hurst, the new building was to include “a specially-designed 16,800 cubic foot studio with a large adjoining master control room,” as well as an isolation room within the studio intended to give “high sound separation to vocal groups or certain sections of a band.”
Woodland Sound Studios would receive a nice bit of enthusiastic ink in Billboard‘s ‘World of Country Music’ 1970 special edition:
Success has come to the Woodland Sound Studios in East Nashville because of the genius of Glen[n] Snoddy, recognized as one of the leading engineers in the country, and now president of that studio. His is the only independent in town with two complete 16 track studios. Woodland also has the Moog, and – unlike any studio anywhere – has an electronic lighting system on three frequencies synchronized to the music. The lights fluctuate to the beat of the music, and change color with pitch. Intended to set the mood for singers and musicians, it has been incredibly effective.
Billboard‘s Bill Williams – in his two-page ‘moves and shakers’ piece about “The Ladies of Nashville” – highlights the critical utility role played by Woodland Sound’s Brenda Blackford who handled “everything from studio booking to artist and client relations.”
That same year, The Tennessean would report on Woodland Sound Studio signing a $100,000 contract with NYC-based A&R Recording (see ad below) for a 24-track recording console.
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Billboard
Glenn Snoddy
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Writer/historian/producer Randy McNutt reflects on Woodland Sound —
In 1968 audio engineer Glenn Snoddy opened Woodland Sound Studios at 1011 Woodland Street, which was not on Music Row. But that didn’t matter. Music Row people came to Woodland because its sound was so good. By 1971 Snoddy was using tape recorders with one, two, four, eight, and 16 tracks; a few years later he upgraded with two 24-track Studer recorders. By 2000 new owner Robert Solomon added to the complex two recording studios (with Neve consoles) and a mastering room. By then, he was still attracting big-name clients.
I recall what the place was like long ago. I mixed a single there in 1975, and the echo sounded terrific. Immediately Woodland became one of my favorite studios. I recall seeing it again in 1998, two months after a vicious tornado had ripped through downtown Nashville. The building’s exterior had sustained some damage, but inside business went on as usual.
Unfortunately, Solomon closed Woodland in 2001, after some issues with the building’s owner, but the studio’s legacy remains in its hits. A few of them include “Honey,” by Bobby Goldsboro; “Knock Three Times,” Billy “Crash” Craddock; “Tennessee Bird Walk,” Jack Blanchard and Misty Morgan; and A-1-A, the Jimmy Buffett album that featured “A Pirate Looks At Forty.”
Woodland Sound was a winner. I won’t forget it.
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Monument Recording Studio
Cash Box
“Foster To Build New Nashville Studios“
NASHVILLE — Monument prexy Fred Foster has announced that the firm is about to begin construction on a $600,000 ultra-modern recording studio, to be located at 110 17th Ave., No., Nashville. He also announced the appointment of two prominent sound engineers, Mort Thomason and Bob Farris to the label’s staff.
Construction on the new building is to begin within the next few weeks, with completion scheduled for approximately Feb. 1, 1967. Meanwhile, operations will continue at the Fred Foster studios, also located in Nashville.
Plans call for the new building to house two studios, one to be the largest in Nashville, measuring 71 by 43 feet with a 28-foot ceiling. Studio One, as it will be called, will have a theater capable of seating 50 persons for unobstructed viewing of recording sessions. The theater will be separated from the studio by one-way glass so no performer will be distracted by viewers.
The design of the acoustical furnishings and equipment for the studios has been relegated to sound consultant Bill Putman, president of Studio Electronics of Los Angeles, who states that the sound console will be a 22-channel unit especially designed for the Foster studio. Other features will include complete mastering equipment for both stereo and mono, five executive offices, a fire-proof vault for tape storage, a large recreation room, complete restaurant facilities with kitchen, dressing rooms with showers, a roof-top sundeck measuring 44 by 26 feet, and parking for 60 cars.
Exclusive of the sundeck the building will contain more than 19,000 square feet, and the front elevation will have two stories of gold anodized aluminum sunscreen with center panel of Santa Fe lava stone.
Engineer Mort Thomason joined the firm last week, while Bob Farris will begin on Aug. 15. Thomason was a pioneer engineer with the Bradley Studios, and, prior to joining Foster, was with Columbia’s Nashville Studio. Farris, from Dallas, was with RCA Victor for a number of years. A former Nashvillian, he will supervise the installation of the electronic equipment. The two will join Thomas Strong and Brent Maher, present Foster Studio engineers.
Fred Foster’s new studio facility, however, did not open its doors until 1969, according to Discogs, whose single photographic image seems to convey a much different design than the one depicted in the Cash Box article. Is it possible that Foster had to scale back some of the more ambitious aspects of his original proposal? Discogs informs us that Foster had been forced to vacate his previous studio — Fred Foster Sound Studios, housed in Sam Phillips‘ former Nashville studio outpost at 319 7th Avenue South — due to a building demolition.
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Mega Records Building
“Rising on the Nashville Skyline“
A full-page ad in Billboard‘s ‘Nashville Spotlight’ special edition of April 25, 1970 announces that production work on various albums and singles was already underway for a new label located on Music Row at 1505 Hawkins Street – Mega Records – whose operations were being underwritten by RPM, Inc., a diversified conglomerate owned by North Atlantic Corporation, later renamed Zemarc.
The heady optimism, however, would be short-lived, according to Discogs —
In 1972, Mega Records became a wholly owned subsidiary of Zemarc, Ltd., a Pennsylvania-based holding company with offices in Nashville. In 1973, Mega Records broke ties with Zemarc and was sold to Zodiac Records, Inc., of Torrance, California, with M. David Bell taking over management. The distribution network set up by Mega was continued for a short time, but soon a new deal was struck with Pickwick, through P.I.P. Records, where Pickwick bought in and Mega became “a Division of Pickwick International, Inc.,” of Woodbury, NY.
By 1976, unfortunately, the cash would run out, says Discogs. Does the building still stand, dare I ask?
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Mercury Records Studio & Offices
Mercury Records’ “new” Nashville studio and office complex opened its doors in May/June of 1970, according to Billboard, under the leadership of Mercury Vice-President, producer, and guitarist, Jerry Kennedy, one of the most in-demand session musicians (e.g., “Harper Valley PTA”). While Mercury’s country product dominates the Nashville operation, Billboard notes, “the label also records one of the nation’s top underground rock acts, Mother Earth, in Nashville.”
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Decca Records Building
“Decca’s New Nashville Offices Make Official Bow“
Cash Box
excerpt –
Located at 803 Sixteenth Avenue South, in the heart of Nashville’s center of recording and music publishing activity, often referred to as Music City, U.S.A., the new building is a two-story structure of modernistic design, featuring wood panelled walls and soft lighting, created by W. B. Cambron and Company, Inc., architect and builder.
The building will house executive offices, reception, audition and rehearsal facilities.
A&R Director Owen Bradley will be in charge of Decca’s new Nashville offices. He will be assisted by Harry Silverstein, who also oversees Decca promotion for the area. Also housed in the building will be branch offices of Northern and Champion Music, Decca’s affiliate publishing firms. These are co-managed by Gerald Nelson and Jerry Crutchfield.
Top label executives including Leonard W. Schneider, executive vice president, and vice president Martin P. Salkin flew to Nashville to be on hand for the opening-day activities and to greet the many Decca artists who live and work in the Nashville area.
Decca’s association with Nashville can be traced to the very early days of the company’s history in the mid 30’s when A&R producers made periodic flights to Nashville to record the ever-increasing number of local artists bidding for national recognition. Many top-name talents in the country field rose to world wide prominence via a recording association with Decca. A number of these remain active, best-selling attractions today, including Ernest Tubb, Kitty Wells, Red Foley, Webb Pierce, Bill Monroe, and Jimmy Davis. Others, have been discovered and gone on to become potent factors in the record industry. Among these: The Wilburn Brothers, Bobby Helms, Goldie Hill, Roy Drusky, [Jimmy] Martin, Grady Martin, Bob Beckham, Loretta Lynn and Connie Hall.
Billboard would issue a similarly-worded item in their August 18, 1962 edition about Decca’s “sleek and shiny new permanent headquarters in Nashville” that also concludes with a quote from Decca executive, Leonard Schneider: “[The new Decca offices are] an expression of our confidence in a venture that is both economically sound and rich in its musical heritage. We’re proud to be a part of this heritage that enriches so many throughout the world.”
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ROI Recording
1961
See: “40 Spectacular Brick Wall Ideas You Can Use For Any House“
Thanks to 45Cat contributors we know that ROI Recording was originally located at 821 19th Avenue South. Tiny little indie ROI label — a pair of 45 releases from 1962 being its total recorded output — appears to be an offshoot of ROI Recording Studios at that same address, listed in 1961 as owned by Murray Nash.
821 19th Avenue South, observes another 45Cat contributor, was also the location for Music City Recorders. Here is what Discogs is able to tell us —
Music City Recorders opened in the early 1960’s, and was bought in 1964 by a group of investors, one of [whom] was Scotty Moore. Scotty operated the studio until 1975 when it was sold again. The current owners, Larry Rogers and Pat Brewer, bought the studio in 1985 and is now operated as Studio 19, Nashville.
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Acuff-Rose Publishing
Billboard‘s Oct. 19, 1968 issue
triumph of decorative brick
under a harvest moon
The two hundred Nashville notables who turned out for the ground-breaking ceremonies for Acuff-Rose’s $400,000 new home were treated to entertainment by Roy Acuff at the nearby Biltmore Court Motor Hotel, as reported in Record World‘s November 5, 1966 edition. After a medley of songs by the late Hank Williams (whose esteemed catalog was published by Acuff-Rose), prominent Nashville master of ceremonies, Bob Jennings, called the event to order —
Jennings then traced the historic highlights of the firm which started a quarter century ago in a one-room office on Capitol Boulevard, which housed a one-man staff, consisting of the late Fred Rose. The company now incorporates more than 50 persons in its world-wide operations, which includes Acuff-Rose offices in 15 countries, the Hickory label identification in more than a dozen countries and publishing and recording representatives in many more nations on four continents.
Acuff-Rose enjoys renown as the first major Nashville-based country music publishing firm — and possibly the first country music publisher to establish offices overseas. Acuff-Rose also founded a music label, Hickory Records, that operated from 1954 until 1987.
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Tree Publishing
Billboard‘s Oct. 28, 1967 issue
pattern block insists you take it seriously
By the mid-1960s, Nashville’s most successful publisher, Tree Publishing, was experiencing giddy growth and preparing to undergo a world-wide expansion, as reported in Cash Box‘s December 24, 1966 edition:
The local growth of Tree Publishing Co., owned by president Jack Stapp and executive vice-president Buddy Killen, has continued to grow at such a rapid pace that the firm not only has a staff of 42 full-time exclusive writers, but has received 55 BMI awards in its short, 13-year existence and is now considered the top song publishing firm in Nashville’s 70 million dollar-a-year music industry.
Cash Box reports that the world-wide tour, intended to set up independent companies in several European countries as well as Japan and Australia, had been organized by Stapp and Lee V. Eastman of Eastman & Eastman, one of the nation’s leading copyright law firms, who served as Tree International’s legal representative. By 1968, that worldwide publishing network would be in place.
Stapp, WSM’s former program director of eighteen years, resigned in 1957 to take over Tree Music Publishing Company, which he purchased from Louis G. Cowan and Harry Fleischman. By 1963, Buddy Killen would be on board as Tree’s number two person.
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Southern Plastics
This half-page ad for Southern Plastics in Record World‘s October 21, 1967 edition states that when it comes to custom pressing from tape to completed product — labels, drop shipping, warehousing — “no one can equal our service for the south.”
Today when you Google map the address for 453 Chestnut Street, you discover that this vinyl enterprise is still very much a going concern today under the name United Record Pressing, who proudly proclaim on their website, “purely vinyl, pressed in Nashville, since 1949” —
United Record Pressing has seen a lot over the last 70 years. From pressing the first Beatles 7” to outgrowing three facilities, United hasn’t lost what has kept it alive and thriving: our passion for also keeping music alive on vinyl records.
Founded in 1949 in Nashville, TN, the company was known for pressing one million records per month and for its astounding and unique history. United also boasts a storied collection of pressing a variety of influential musical titles, including many of the Motown hits and album covers such as Bob Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited, Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue, and Jay-Z’s The Black Album.
United Record Pressing
Google photo (2022)
Art shot by Steve Greer
United was a contract presser for RCA during the 1970s, according to Discogs, who says that the company’s current capacity make it the largest US vinyl manufacturer:
Over the years, URP stockpiled record presses acquired from the closure of other US manufacturers, including Dixie Record Pressing Inc. in 2000. On June 1, 2016, United acquired Bill Smith Custom Records. In February 2020 URP acquired sixteen additional presses from the closure of Rainbo Records making URP the largest record manufacturer in the USA with a capacity of 60,000 records per day.
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Certron Corporation
In October of 1969, according to Billboard, producer/songwriter Aubrey Mayhew purchased a $50,000 house in Music Row located at 1226 16th Avenue South that was to be his new base of operations. Mayhew had quietly severed ties with his former label, Little Darlin‘ (co-founded with Donald “Johnny Paycheck” Lytle), in order to be the general manager for a new music division being set up in Nashville by the Anaheim, California-based Certron Corporation. Mayhew was to be given autonomy for handling all aspects of Certron’s music operations, including recording, publishing, and distribution. Certron’s business interests included ownership of one-stops, racks, and distributorships, and Mayhew was helping to establish distribution points for the company’s country music product line.
Certron’s new record label founded and overseen by Mayhew, however, was only active briefly between the years 1970 and 1971 — was this proposed design for Certron’s Music Division, therefore, ever built?
Unbuilt Design?
Certron Corp. Music Division
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Unbuilt Design?
Music City Tower
Anticipated ribbon cutting in 1972
21-story multi-purpose building on 16th Ave
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News item in Billboard‘s Apr. 25, 1970 edition
“…Where the Boom Continues“
The building boom along Music Row in Nashville is still in its infancy, if present indications can be accepted. The expansion plans for the next few years almost stagger the imagination. In the midst of it all will be [?] the Music City Tower, a six million dollar, 21-story, multipurpose building right on 16th Avenue. The structure, with unusual styling, will include commercial tenants on the ground floor, a 40-unit motel, eight floors of offices and four floors of parking for 357 cars. Don Pinckley, one of the developers, said the land will face the proposed Music City Boulevard. His group has formed a partnership which includes some of the top professional people in the city. Completion of the building is due in 1972. Pinckley, who said he strongly believes in the progress of Nashville,” especially in the music industry,” also said more than a third of the space in the building has already been leased. Current plans call for a bank branch on the ground floor, and a club owned by Boots Randolph. The latter will have facilities for broadcasting and taping television shows. The building actually will resemble a tower, with sharply setback tiers rising from a base 442 feet long.
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The robustness of Nashville’s economic vitality in the new century means intense land use pressures for new construction that often triumph over the aims of preservationists. In 2016, the Tennessee Historical Commission’s State Review Board unanimously approved the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s survey (i.e., Multiple Property Designation Form or MPDF) of Music Row’s historic significance. The National Trust’s research identified 64 properties that are eligible for the National Register.
In June of 2019, the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County’s Planning Department released a 78-page “Music Row Vision Plan.”
Despite its prominent role in the music industry, the report notes with concern, present-day Music Row faces a loss – paradoxically – “of the very businesses that define it.” Of the 53 demolitions that have taken place between 2010 and 2018, all but ten were music-related structures, according to the National Trust for Historic Preservation. The proximity of these demolitions in combination with newly-created zoning districts heightens development pressure on the “creative cluster,” and it is Music Row’s own architectural heritage that is instrumental (so to speak) “to telling Nashville’s music story,” the report’s authors emphasize.
Music Row Historic District
images courtesy of Music Row Vision Plan
Those who want to help in the preservation effort should contact Historic Nashville, Inc., who is working in partnership with the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
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Time Machine:
Mid-Century Music City Map
(1970)
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For a deeper dive:
See Robbie D. Jones & Carolyn Brackett‘s 232-page MPDF submitted to the National Register of Historic Places in 2019 – an authoritative historical overview that establishes “the local, state, and national significance of the Music Row neighborhood.”
LINK:
“Historic Resources on Music Row, 1954-1989“
– photo excerpt –
SESAC’s Nashville office –
Once managed by Big Joe Talbot
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