Mar 3, 2008 3:38 PM

Mix May 2008 Editorial Coverage: ALL NASHVILLE!

When Mix editors started floating topics for the annual May Special Issue, we kept coming back to one place: Nashville. It's got recording, live, business, songwriting, publishing, distribution, stars and chart-toppers. And right now Nashville is the hottest market in the country. So hot that to cover it right, we had to take it beyond print. So hot that we had to create a two-day event. A Mix Nashville Portal. Video. Audio. A Mix Nashville Program Guide. All for May 2008. We call it "Nashville on Nashville."

TalkBack: Your Nashville Stories
n the March and April 2008 “Feedback” columns and MixLine e-newsletters, we asked readers to tell us about their most memorable Nashville sessions and about how the scene has changed over the years. Read more

Nashville Now
When I came to Mix as an editor/writer 25 years ago this fall, I remember a feature crossing my desk a few months into my tenure that was titled something like “Nashville: More Than Just Country Music.” The gist, of course, was that although Music City was known far and wide as the undisputed capital of country music, the area's studios were also churning out other styles. Read more

State of the City
Asking some Nashville music pros about the state of the recording industry this spring is akin to asking New England Patriots fans what they thought of the last Super Bowl. Read more

Nashville Perspectives
PORTER WAGONER BREAKS THE MOLD
“The sound of ‘Jolene’ was pretty unique for [1973], and part of it is what Larry Londin played. Everybody thinks of him as the great Nashville drummer — well, this was one of the first things he did in Nashville. Read more

Recording Bluegrass Instruments
Tradition runs deep in the bluegrass music community. At the same time, no one expects albums today to be made the way they were when Bill Monroe, Flatt & Scruggs, the Stanley Brothers and the genre's other pioneers were cutting mono records direct to disk, often using just one or two microphones. Read more

History Lesson
Just out of the Navy in 1946, guitarist Harold Bradley was anxious to record some country music. So he headed to Chicago to meet up with Pee Wee King. Read more

Laying Down "Crossroads"
The Country Music Television (CMT) Series Crossroads, now in its seventh season, brings country artists together in concert with mainstream rock and pop artists, staging one-of-a-kind performances that explore musical roots and where they intersect. Read more

Nashville Live!
Any place where there's a lot of live music, there's sound reinforcement, and with all the activity originating from the Nashville Metro area, engineers and sound companies are as busy as the musicians. Read more

Soundcheck Nashville
Soundcheck Nashville does tour pre-production on a grand scale. Not only can clients book video and full-on production rehearsals, but they can also come in and talk endorsement deals with the likes of Shure, Meyer Sound, Digidesign, DiGiCo, Fender, etc. Read more

A Tour of Nashville Venues
The streets of Nashville are lined with intimate venues that host a wide range of artists wanting to be seen — and heard — as they showcase their talent for an approving audience while hoping to make a business deal or two. This is Music City, after all. Read more

Audio for the Ages
No trip to Nashville would be complete without a visit to the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum (CMHOF), which in 2001 relocated to a gleaming, modern 130,000-square-foot complex that's truly the crown of downtown Nashville. Read more

Label-Studio Combo
Not everyone can be Jimmy Bowen or Tony Brown, but not everyone needs to be. The record business offers more definitions of success than radio has music genres. The trick is to find that place where you're doing what you love, you're true to yourself, you're challenged every day, but you're still making a living. Read more

Tony Brown's Nashville
The Platinum producer has strong opinions about country music's place in his city and what makes Nashville great. Here are a few of Brown's off-the-cuff observations after living, playing and producing in Nashville for more than 25 years. Read more