A Moment of Musical Magic

We should have known that the “famous” place was not really what we were looking for when we saw the tour buses parked out front, the large gift shop inside, and the various groups of young teenagers from out of town with their parents or sponsors. This was a bit more “Disney-like” than we were after. So, after a little line-dancing to pre-recorded music, and sampling the overly slick live act that followed, we headed down the street to the “legendary” hole-in-the-wall we had heard mentioned by several. The night before when we had passed by it was too crowded to make it past the threshold, but tonight only a half-dozen patrons joined us in the space that only slightly bested an average walk-in closet. On the tiny stage near the entrance a drummer and a guitarist were lazily adjusting this and tuning that. The place, to put it gently, was dead.

After awhile, a few more patrons trickled in, and still the pair of musicians on stage aimlessly slow-motioned their way through a few more set-up routines. It was almost like they were killing time.

We had been there perhaps 30 minutes when a thin, guitar-case carrying man hidden beneath an acreage of black cowboy hat strolled in. A cheer went up from the crowd that had almost instantly swelled to choking proportions, and within minutes his instrument was strapped around his neck and music pounded the tiny space. Suddenly, joining the three musicians on the tiny stage, a thick-waisted young man in a brown dress suit with short, moussed hair who looked every bit like a game show host, stepped onto the stage with a fiddle that erupted in lightning bolts of sound. Fingers and bow scorched along the neck and strings with such ferocity I didn’t see how they could survive. It was breathtaking.

And he, it turns out, was simply a guest – someone connected with a reality TV show that was filming up and down the street. Perhaps he was something of a game show host, after all. Whatever else he is, he was last night a serendipitous spark that quickly caught flame. And in that cramped and smoky room, woven through the music and the magical moment and the captivated crowd, was something powerfully, creatively, electrically holy.

It was time to leave, but we couldn’t. The sleepy little space into whose back stools we had leisurely settled was now squeezed airlessly, impassably tight – packed with people, cemented with music. And it was good – indescribably good. Ah! Nashville.