Thank you to Nashville Convention and Visitors Corp for hosting my trip in Music City so I could write this detailed article.
The neon guitars of Broadway begin glowing long before sunset, when Nashville’s famed honky-tonks begin to spill music out into the streets. Inside more than 30 bars, bands play nonstop free live music from every genre. The experience is a rite of passage for Nashville’s new visitors.
But beyond Broadway’s crowded American jubilee lies another Music City – one where historic studios, intimate listening rooms, and world-class museums reveal a deeper musical legacy.
Now home to nearly two million people, Nashville has transformed into one of the fastest-growing cultural capitals in the American South. This land of creativity continues to bloom, from legendary stages where country icons still perform, to new galleries, restaurants, and cultural institutions shaping the city’s next chapter.
To experience Nashville beyond the honky-tonk, follow the music to where the city’s true rhythm comes alive.
Live Music Lives Here
On a Saturday night at the Grand Ole Opry, the atmosphere is timeless. We settle into two of the 4,400 seats as the curtain rises on America’s longest-running radio broadcast, now celebrating its 100th anniversary. The evening’s “Opry 100” program features a parade of country royalty – including Keith Urban, Blake Shelton, Trace Adkins, and Vince Gill – honoring country legend Ronnie Milsap’s 50th anniversary as an Opry member.
One of the night’s most mesmerizing performances came courtesy of 26-year-old Ella Langley, who delivered a tear-jerking rendition of Milsap’s hit “I Wouldn’t Have Missed It For The World,” before introducing her new song, “Dandelion.”
In Nashville, live music doesn’t begin and end at a music venue. It greets travelers at the airport, drifts from open windows downtown, and even plays from some of the traffic control boxes. Throughout the city, a small guitar-pick symbol identifies venues that host live music three nights a week or more.
The city is host to more than 250 vibrant venues to experience and learn about music.
Begin a day downtown with the Walk of Fame Park, a 2.6-acre landmark honoring musicians and industry professionals of all genres, who have made significant contributions to Music City.
At night, start with the music listening room at the Station Inn, nestled in the Gulch neighborhood, where the world’s best bluegrass, classic country, Americana, and roots musicians perform seven nights a week. It’s an up close and personal experience where musicians and singers from all over the world gather and enjoy making music together.
Inside the Birthplace of Hits
Before the Grand Ole Opry, the Ryman Auditorium (once a Tabernacle) was the soul of Nashville. Built in 1892, this premier concert venue (a National Historic Landmark) boasts amazing acoustics and the same wooden benches. Deemed the Mother Church of Country Music, artists are honored to perform and often bring special guests or play songs publicly for the first time. While we were in Nashville, the buzz on the street was that Billy Strings was playing at the Ryman and that tickets were going for thousands of dollars. If you can’t make one of the 200 shows a year, the venue offers daytime tours year-round with a photo on stage – where artists like Bruce Springsteen, Harry Styles, and Lizzo have performed in recent years.
Along Music Row, find historic RCA Studio B, where visitors can tour Elvis’s favorite place to record, before snapping a photo seated at Elvis’s favorite piano. Open since 1942 and nicknamed “The Home of a Thousand Hits,” Studio B became famous in the 1960s for producing what has come to be known as “The Nashville Sound.” Roy Orbison, Dolly Parton, Waylon Jennings, and the Everly Brothers all recorded here.
The Gallery of Iconic Guitars at Belmont University houses some of the most rare and iconic stringed instruments ever known! The exhibits are experiential and not behind glass – pick up and play an instrument from part of the collection, like the unique sounds of a Mandocello Guitar with 8 strings or a guitar banjo from 1922.
Upon entering the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, we are quickly reminded that the definition of country music is “three chords and the truth,” coined by legendary Nashville songwriter Harlan Howard in the 1950s. Fascinating exhibits abound, especially the wing exploring Dolly Parton’s 60-year career – focusing on how she overcame industry obstacles and critics – with a delightful array of her costumes, handwritten lyrics, old photos and vintage videos of her performing live. Visitors have until September, 2026 to absorb Dolly’s evolution from a young songwriter to a global icon and national treasure.
Thanks to the artist herself, a Taylor Swift Education Center in the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum provides interactive learning experiences and a rotating exhibit of her career artifacts. Meander through the chronological history of country music on the same floor with a renowned collection of impressive objects, from vintage rides to instruments to costumes.
In 2021, the National Museum of African American Music debuted in the new Fifth and Broadway complex, in the heart of Downtown. From classical, to country, to jazz and hip hop, NMAAM integrates history and interactive technology to share the untold story of more than 50 music genres and subgenres.
Creative Nashville
In 2019 the Frederic Hart Studio Museum opened to showcase one of America’s greatest sculptors. Hart created works that forever changed the national landscape – such as Washington National Cathedral’s Creation Sculptures and the “Three Soldiers” bronze at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. While there are no finished works in the studio, it offers a glimpse into Hart’s process, where there is much to admire.
Since 2003, LeQuire Gallery & Studio has showcased some of Nashville’s most popular artists. Learn about the clay to bronze process in the artist studio as the daily life of Alan LeQuire’s monumental works of art come alive. Appreciate his grand tree trunk torsos made with varying textures, colossal heads of influential American musicians and activists, and large-scale relief sculpture. Discover how he came to create Musica, one of the largest sculpture groups in the US – displayed at a Demonbreun Street roundabout and Music Row intersection – that may soon turn into a Bellagio-like fountain. LeQuire’s other famous works can be found around town such as Nashville Women’s Suffrage Memorial and a 42-foot replica of an ancient Athena Pathenos statue inside the Nashville Parthenon.
History & Heritage
Dive into the Victorian past at the Belmont Mansion, a historic museum located on the campus of Belmont University. One of the largest homes built in Tennessee prior to the Civil War, explore one of the few 1850s era homes still standing in Nashville, while learning about the people – free, enslaved, and immigrant – whose stories make this site worth understanding.
One of the most elaborate antebellum homes in the South, featuring 36 rooms and 19,000 square feet, the entire Belmont estate was built, furnished, and landscaped by the Acklen family. The property boasted such luxuries as lavish gardens, an art gallery, a bowling alley, and even a zoo. Most impressive today is the light-filled 58-foot Grand Salon, with original wallpaper in one corner, original Venetian glass windows that cast colorful light, and the Tennessee chocolate marble fireplace.
Belle Meade is another remarkable historic site worth witnessing. This former 5,400-acre private plantation was famous for its thoroughbred horse breeding. Built in the mid-to-late 1800s, four presidents have stayed at the 1853 Greek Revival Mansion. Equine art lines the entrance, telling the stories of America’s oldest horse nursery and most famous horses. The thirty acres that remain showcase many architectural treasures, a gardener’s house, an ice house to store food, a smokehouse for pigs, a carriage house, a mausoleum for once 16 bodies, and more.
Tour Belle Meade and sip bourbon or wine with a food pairing at Nashville’s first and oldest winery. The newly renovated hay loft is now a gorgeous rustic culinary space with wine bar and library donned in hickory wood. Don’t miss trying their sweet Blackberry wine and Red Muscadine. You can sample southern cuisine on site too at Belle Meade Meat & Three inside the Visitor’s Center, and choose from various options like smoked meats, butter beans, fried okra, collard greens, and bread pudding.
Southern Hospitality Meets Global Cuisine
Nashville’s culinary reputation has expanded almost as rapidly as its population, and it only takes a few meals to set off on a culinary journey. There’s more than typical Southern fare, homestyle “meat & three”, smoky barbecue, and fiery Nashville fried hot chicken. Sample the unexpected, like middle-eastern food from the largest Kurdish population in the US.
In 2025, the Michelin Guide launched a new American South edition and debuted in Nashville, recognizing 21 venues with several receiving one star.
In east Nashville, Michelin Guide recommended Folk showcases seasonal local produce. Try vegetable-forward dishes and naturally leavened crisp thin pizzas like Pecorino Fonduta with pancetta and chive doused in egg yolk with a spritz of lemon.
In Germantown, 5th & Taylor occupies a historic warehouse anchored by a grand sculpture of General Francis Nash, Nashville’s namesake. Share a Grilled Wedge Salad, Tomato Pie, and Buttermilk Biscuits with apple jam and reserve cheddar then indulge in hearty comfort dishes like Lamb Pot Roast with butternut squash, Short Rib with mashed potatoes, and Beer Can Chicken.
For breakfast in the Hillsboro Village neighborhood, the Pancake Pantry has been serving scratch made pancakes since 1961. After shopping around the area with cute boutiques, rest your feet with a big decision – which 23 pancake varieties to choose from. While eggs, waffles, sandwiches, and salads are available starting at 6 AM, this low-key spot is the place to try a pancake sampler – Caribbean (pecan, coconut, sliced bananas), peanut butter chocolate chip, and sweet potato, a Taylor Swift favorite.
Pioneering carhop service, iconic retro Mel’s Diner, opened its first location outside of California here in Nashville in 2025. Order all-day breakfast at this 1950s restaurant in the heart of downtown, near honky-tonk row, or sink your teeth into Mel’s popular smash burger with fried pickles or short rib grilled cheese, paired with a milkshake. Since you’re in the South, top it off with the Tennessee whiskey chocolate pecan pie.
For bold Italian flavors and big vibes, book a dinner reservation in The Gulch at fun new V Modern Italian, as the V represents feeding all five senses. Stracciatella arrives playfully smoking out the side of the glass while tableside fun includes options, like a make your own cannoli carrier filling Italian cream shells and a Cocktail Carousel cart concocting cocktails with smoking dry ice. Choose from house-made pastas, wood fired pizzas, and festive dishes crafted in collaboration with Michelin-starred chef Stefano Ciotti.
Nashville After Dark
Ready to laugh it up? Legendary Zanies nightclub is the place to go! Your phone is sealed at the door and the comedy scene draws national headliners and makes for a therapeutic evening. Up and coming comedians take the stage on Monday nights. The two brothers who own Zanies started a comedy festival in April, celebrating local talent and comedians from all over the world. This place pairs nonstop laughs with cocktails and a rollout of eats like Nachos, Quesadillas, and warm cookie with ice cream.
Soon, one of the most exciting and gorgeous venues to come to Music City will be tucked behind Mel’s, the Vinyl Vault! Slip into the back of Mel’s Diner to enter this Prohibition-style speakeasy bar with multiple rooms where DJs will spin vinyl against an alluring backdrop of high-ceilinged windows, old school fireplaces, and a bank vault turned photo booth. Expect a Locals Only entrance too, as this upcoming nightlife hotspot opens across the way from the Dolly Parton Hotel and Museum, slated to open in summer 2026.
Where to Stay
Nashville’s hotel scene has evolved with its growth. Adjacent to Vanderbilt University, Kimpton Aertson Hotel offers contemporary spacious rooms and complimentary Happy Hour with bites in the lobby. Guests can easily walk the nearby campus to peruse over 80 public sculptures and art installations integrated into the grounds.
Downtown, the 28-story Sheraton Grand Nashville Downtown features recently renovated spacious suites, with expansive windows, offering sweeping views of the city skyline and Capitol. A Concierge Lounge offers a nice place to relax – with elevated views, breakfast and other bites.
The city blooms with a bevy of new luxurious hotel stays – such as the Conrad, Four Seasons, Union Station, 1 Hotel, Thompson and five-star Hermitage – while the city will continue to elevate with hotels from Nobu, the Ritz, Edition, Fairmont, and Pendry in the coming years.
The New Nashville
Country music may have built Nashville’s reputation, but today, the city’s cultural identity stretches far and wide. From legendary recording studios to late-night bluegrass sessions, acclaimed museums, and an evolving culinary scene, Nashville continues to reinvent itself while remaining true to its musical heritage.
Step beyond Broadway’s neon glow and Music City reveals a richer rhythm, one that plays on long after the last honky-tonk band finishes its set.
