Re: If You Missed It.......
> >
> > Were it not for the "Opry", country music might eventually
>
> > had "made it" anyway, but Nashville would not be country
> > music's home.
> >
> who wrote this? they must not know about opryland..
>
> Some artists complain there's still too much twang and that
> since its 1974 move to a shopping center complex, it's more
> tourist destination than concert hall.
>
> shopping mall since 2000 but it was a theme park! the writer
> must be a kid!!
>
What he was talking about was from a historical standpoint before the Opry became the pony show you have with "opryland" today. The good ole Ryman Auditorium days.
Yeah country would have made it but would have taken many more years and would have probably came up a little different that what we know of it today possibly.
But the real thing that brought country to the forefront, was not the opry in my opinion (but it played a big hand), but instead, our love on here of Claudia Schiffer
.....Nope ,Radio... Remember, going to a big city like Nashville was a big thing that was done maybe once a year in the rural areas and you may have heard bands roll into town once a fortnight or less unless you were lucky to have a few around you. radio however brought it to places that it never been before and the Opry was like a Saturday night barn dance for these folks albet you could not see them.
But yeah gaylord Entertainment and others commercialized it for every dime they could... The opry still has it's luster, but not IMO like being at the Ryman on a real auditorium stage in say the 1950s and being over WSM (that was one of the most powerful stations in the nation..and which help deliver country to more people also).
But we should also not forget others that changed music as we know it also, Like the "Louisiana hayride" from Shreveport that brought stars who sometimes was too wild for the Opry, but made some of the most memorable music.
My opinion on smashedcd's comment about some thinking country music still has too much twang, you have to remember that country has followed trends set by popular music for years. However, country music is a conservative style of music where we will take the influences,but we don't change totally because of it and hince we still stay true to our roots of our music with stars like Alan Jackson but we also expand with groups like Rascall Flats that save for the slight country lean, could probably play well on A/c or Christian stations today. But on the radio, we hear more of the newer groups because radio is trying to go after the proverbial 38 year old house wife who might be conservative to the music on a/c today and hince more groups like Rascall Flats. But I see that country music is starting to embrace it's traditional side more with more groups aimed at other demos than just that housewife (as country music is the music for a lot of smaller rural america where GAC and CMT are found more than say MTV)
Sorry for the long reply, but both of you got stuff I just wanted to comment on in great detail
RFLA
