Country Music Hall of Fame

I was in Nashville with a dear friend and her daughter. We were there for a meeting or conference or something. I was just there because I wanted to be near my friend. What I did not want was to go to the Country Music Hall of Fame. I am not a fan. I went anyway, because I knew that sometimes things surprise you and it was better than sitting around alone.

I found myself wandering around an exhibit called We Could: The Songwriting Artistry of Boudleaux and Felice Bryant. It was about a couple who wrote a lot of songs back in the day. I mean, a lot. They wrote things I had heard before, I knew their work, but had never known them. But it wasn’t how prolific they were that caught my eye: it was their manuscripts and notebooks.

When I saw the manuscripts and notebooks, I suddenly realized that I was a songwriter. I felt connected to a group of people called songwriters. I had many pages that looked just like theirs, strewn around my home. My compositions had little scribbles of notes and strikethrough sections just like theirs. Something clicked inside of me, I was a songwriter. I belonged.

I pondered this as I wandered around the rest of the museum and then I came across another exhibit: OUTLAWS AND ARMADILLOS: COUNTRY’S ROARING ’70s. This exhibit featured country singers that felt pushed out of the country music industry by the newer sounds coming into the country music mainstream. They wanted to keep singing “their” version of country music, but were finding it hard to do so. They felt like outsiders. So, in true rebel fashion, they made their own label and produced their own albums.

Here it was again, a group that felt excluded. A group that felt like they were on the outside. A group that did something about it. They created their own space to belong. Talk about a sacred echo: Meow Wolf, The Sawdust Festival, Outlaw Records.

This lesson began sinking into my heart and soul. I couldn’t believe it, the Country Music Hall of Fame had changed something in me. Something started to heal. I had found permission to write and play my music.