Your guide today is the building itself: country music people call the Ryman Auditorium the Mother Church, and not entirely as a metaphor. Thomas Ryman, a Nashville riverboat captain and saloon owner, built this tabernacle in 1892 after attending a revival led by evangelist Samuel Jones and experiencing a conversion so complete that he funded a permanent home for Jones to preach in. For decades the Union Gospel Tabernacle, as it was known, hosted revivals, operas, boxing matches, and lectures by figures including Booker T. Washington and William Jennings Bryan.
Then in 1943, the Grand Ole Opry radio program moved here from a smaller venue and stayed for thirty-one years. Those three decades defined American country music. Hank Williams played these pews.
Patsy Cline, Johnny Cash, Minnie Pearl, Bill Monroe, Roy Acuff — they all worked this stage, performing to the live radio audience that broadcast their voices across the continent. When the Opry moved to its new suburban home in 1974, the Ryman nearly came down. It survived, was restored, and now operates again as a premier concert venue.
The acoustics are still extraordinary. The wooden pews are still in place.