The Grand Ole Opry Cast

Josh and Chuck take a virtual walk through country music's legendary music venue. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff you Should Know, a production of I
Heart Radio, how D and welcome to the podcast. I'm
Josh Clark. There's Charles W Chuck Bryan over there, there's
Jerry Jerome Roland, and this is Stuff you should Know, folks. Yeah. Uh,

(00:25):
Can I do a little plug right off the beginning
to sort of explain why I got this idea? Yeah? Yeah, sure,
because this episode is on the Grand Old Opry in Nashville, Tennessee,
the longest running radio broadcast in US history, and they
sent you a check. No, I gotta an email, Jesus.
I feel like a long time ago from a Stuff

(00:46):
you Should Know listener in a movie Crusher named Joseph
I'm gonna pronounce it tin l t I n n
e l L And he is the content and programming
director of WSM Radio, which you'll learn all about that here. Uh.
And he runs the show and he started at staying
we kind of had some back and forth over the

(01:06):
years about um me coming to the Rieman to see
a show, and he's like, I could I haven't mentioned
on Movie Crush. He said, I can get you backstage
if you ever want to come to Nashville and go
to a show with the Ryman, and so we've been
communicating for a long time. And then this past year
he started, uh, what's called the WSM Playlist, which is

(01:26):
they turned the radio station over to someone for an
hour and let them DJ and program. And he offered
that to me and I did it? Wow? And when
did you tell everybody about it? On stuff I'm doing
right now? Oh, when is it gonna play? It is?
It's you know, you record it so they can release
it whenever. So you you did covers of all the
songs that you wanted on the playliss I, I just DJ. Basically,

(01:50):
It's gonna air five pm Central time, July one at
five pm Central on ws M Radio Home in the
Grand ol Opry. You can find it online at w
s M radio dot com. Just hit the listen live button.
On July one at five pm Central, we'll hear me
spinning records from Uncle Tupelo and Bonnie Prince Billy and

(02:11):
Dolly Parton and Johnny Cash. I can't remember who. Well,
it's a lot of a lot of great stuff that's awesome.
Did you do that thing where you like you just
held the one uh like can up to your ear
from the headphones. Now, I was a little nervous though,
and I felt that was a little stiff and loosened
up and then send it to him and I was like, hey,

(02:32):
I feel like I didn't do great at first. And
he said, yeah, you were a little stiff. And he said,
why don't you redo the first We call him all
these radio lingoes like ins and outs and you know,
raps and things like that, because you gotta talk about
the last song and then the next song. And so
he let me redo the first kind of set of
those and hopefully I'm a little more loose. It's always

(02:54):
better the second take. It is. Willie Nelson's in there.
I got some good stuff. That's really cool. Man, can gratulations, Chuck.
I feel like you finally made it. You're a member
of the Grand Old Operation. No, no, no, we'll talk
all about that. That's the old deal. So um we
are talking Grand Old opry. Uh. And now I'm nervous
about it because the station manager is going to be listening.
And by the way, this episode, what was his name,

(03:18):
Joseph Tinnell. Joseph prepared to be disappointed criticisms. He's a
stuff you should know listener and the movie Crusher two.
Of course he's a nice guy. So we're talking Grand
Old Opry today, and you said something that I find
just fascinating that it is I don't know if you

(03:40):
said in the world, but it is the oldest, longest
running live radio broadcast program in the entire world. It's
been broadcasting The Grand Old Opry, which is a radio show.
A lot of people think it's it's a music venue,
and it is, but really the music venue kind of
grew out of the radio show. It all. It began

(04:00):
as a radio show, um, all the way back in
so it's coming pretty close to its hundredth the anniversary.
And in all that time, it's only missed one Saturday
night broadcast, one live Saturday night broadcast. Every other Saturday
night all the way back to you could tune into

(04:21):
WUSM Nashville AM six fifty and here the Grand Old
Opry radio program, which is I mean, hats off to that.
I don't care if you think country Western music is
as bad as experimental smooth jazz, doesn't matter. You still
have to tip your hat to that. Yeah, tip that stetson. Uh,

(04:44):
we should tell them why that they missed that one broadcast.
It was after the assassination of Martin Luther King. The
city of Nashville, I think most of Tennessee probably was
under curfew, so they had to rerun a program, and
I think they did a live show the next day
or or something during the day earlier that day before,
I believe they tried to show. So they still did

(05:05):
a show that day. They just missed the live broadcast
that night, but all the other ones dating back, they
made pretty neat. Yeah. I actually went um when I
was a kid. We went to it was an amusement
park called opry Land, USA, which is now I think
sort of a shopping center mall kind of thing, but

(05:25):
back then it was an amusement park like a country.
It was pretty Dollywood. Oh you went to the opry Land, USA?
Oh wow? Okay, Yeah, And so we also went to
the Grand ol opry House. And I don't know if
it was a Saturday show. I know they do shows
on Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, but um, I don't remember
much about it, do But I do remember being in

(05:47):
that building and seeing the sort of barn shaped motif stage,
and that's kind of all I remember. I was probably
no more than six or seven. I don't know what
it is, but they're nothing more cozy than a building
within a building. Yeah, you know, I definitely loved the

(06:09):
stage for the Grand Old Opry for sure. Alright, So
the Grand Old Opry started out out of indirectly out
of Chicago. That was something called the National Barn Dance,
which was a radio broadcast out of Chicago playing country music,
uh way back in the day, and it had a
really big following, but it didn't reach Nashville. So the

(06:32):
former UM, a former DJ from there named George Hay
went to Nashville became the station manager at WSM and
pitched what he called, um the Barn Dance, Yeah, which
was a lot like National Barn Dance. But He's like,
but here's the difference. We dropped the National. Yeah. It

(06:52):
was kind of like a proto heehaw and that they had.
It was a variety show. They had music, they had dancers,
they had comedy bits and sketches, um, all with that
sort of country fide flavor. I almost wonder if he
Hall was influenced by the Grand Old Operation, think a
little bit, but it was. So it was on WSM,
as you were saying that the barn Dance is what

(07:14):
you know Grand old Opry radio program was originally called
for the first couple of years, and that guy George
Hay who pitched it and hosted it, had had been
at that radio station in Chicago, but now he worked
for WSM, which was actually an insurance company's radio station.
It's a very strange story, it is, but they they
were there were the headquarters in the National Life and

(07:37):
Accident Insurance Company, headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee. And I apparently
one of the executives there was really into this new
technology radio and I was high enough up in the
company that he got the company to start broadcasting from
the fifth floor UM. And so that's where that first
early program was broadcast from. Was this insurance company UM

(08:01):
headquarters like office building on Saturday nights. Yeah. And if
you're wondering what w O s M stands for, because
it was from the insurance company, it stands for We
Shield Millions, still known as w s M. It's really funny.
I tried to find out who this executive was, but
I couldn't. I couldn't look at it. Yeah, that's you know,

(08:22):
it's crazy how people can become lost to history, even
though their story is just so wrapped up in something
that's everywhere. All it takes is for them just getting
knocked out of one, you know, one popular article and
everybody else who picks up on that after that, Yeah,
they're not coming back, you know. All right. So the
Barn Dance, they had their first broadcast on November had

(08:44):
uncle Jimmy Thompson, who was a Tennessee musician and won
a fiddling competition in Texas, was a big, big hit,
and within just a few months there were people literally
coming down to this insurance building to watch live through
the US the glass walls of the studio very cool. Yeah,
all this reminds me of um oh brother or art

(09:07):
that when they go into the recording studio. I think
it's very similar to that kind of thing, right, So
like they kind of knew, like, no, this is this
might be a thing, like this is kind of a
people are showing up, you know, in person on Saturday
night at an insurance company's offices to watch this stuff.
And it kind of started to take off pretty quickly.

(09:29):
And it was I think when George Hay famously said,
um about this preceding like radio or classical music Appreciation
Hour that we've been listening to music largely from the
Grand Opera. From now on we will present the Grand
Old Opry. And apparently everybody thought that was hysterical, and

(09:50):
that became the name of the show from that time on.
I think in December of it is pretty cool, yeah,
And so there were these weekly performances every Saturday, UM
at the National Life and Accident Insurance Company's headquarters. But
more and more people started to show up, and I
saw somewhere, Chuck, I love this. It's like a full

(10:12):
circle irony. But at the time, the leaders the of Nashville,
the heads of business and UM, a lot of the
other you know, the politicians, the wealthy people who are
running the show in Nashville, were trying to move the
city's image in the exact opposite direction of what they
were doing every Saturday night at the insurance company's headquarters.

(10:35):
Like they were trying to basically say, Nashville is not
no mountain folk here, no holdowns going on here. Just
we're just like every were like New York, where the
New York of the middle of America. I kind of thing.
And they really resented the Grand Old Opery because it
was getting more and more popular. And then finally the
Grand Old Opry became so powerful and such an institution

(10:59):
in nash Fille that it in large part became the
leaders of the city and it shaped Nashville. Like Nashville
wasn't music city until the Grand Ole Opry came along
and they were trying to take it in a different direction.
The Grand ol Opry took it in that that direction
of basically establishing like the headquarters of country western music.

(11:20):
Uh and put Nashville on the map in that very
legitimate way. It had three consecutive mayors killed it did
to accomplish this feed that's all poisoned. Oh no, that's
not true at all. People who run the Grand ol
Opry that are listening right now, we wei, yeah, I
do feel like someone's looking over our shoulder. All right,

(11:42):
So you know what, let's take a break and then
we'll talk about kind of the change in venues over
the years and how that represents the rise of the
Grand ol Opry in prominence. Right after this, all right,

(12:16):
so you're you're throwing these hoe downs in an insurance building.
It's going well, people are showing up, mayors are dropping
like flies, trying to fight this thing to be big city,
New York City in Tennessee. Uh. And so they said
we gotta move. So they said, all right, first thing
we'll do is we'll move into an actual auditorium space
here in the same building. That worked for a little while.

(12:38):
Then in thirty four they moved to the Hillsborough Theater
Community Playhouse now called the Bellcourt Theater um started selling
some ads, making a little dough. I think two years
later they outgrew that moved to the Dixie Tabernacle, which
was a religious hall um, sort of an old timmy
sort of revival house, and they were there for a

(12:59):
few years before they said, you know what, I don't
like this wild audience coming in here on the drink
and acting all crazy and dancing in the aisle. So
get out of the Dixie Tabernacle and they moved to
the War Memorial Auditorium, which is when they started selling
tickets for a quarter apiece in n nine and started

(13:21):
I think they even got um a spot on NBC.
They were in a movie. Things started happening in a
big way. Yeah, it was a big deal. In thirty
nine when NBC started broadcasting them on the radio, uh,
to a national audience. I mean, first of all, it's
it's now it's national, and that certainly legitimizes it. But
the fact that one of the big broadcasters at the

(13:42):
time thought it was an important enough show to to
pick it up and you know, send it out to
everybody else, that's a that's a huge And this is
you know, less than twenty years after it's about fifteen
years after the Grand Old Opry first went on the air.
That's pretty impressive stuff. Um. And then they moved on
i think nineteen forty three to the Rhyman Theater, which

(14:06):
is one of the places that the Grand Old Opery
is synonymous with. Right, yeah, and that's I'm dying to
go to a show there. I'll make it there at
some point, hopefully get that backstage tour from Joseph. But
it was it's a legendary theater. It was there for
thirty years. Umye hundred seats. It's the mother Church of
country music. And I think they raised the price to

(14:29):
eighty cents there. Um. We'll talk a little bit more
about how the Rymans still figures in today, but it
was that's when things really I mean, if you're in
the seat venue, filling it up a few times a week,
that's your your big time. At that point, I think
they um the regular cast what played Carnegie Hall in
the forties went on tour in Europe and they were

(14:50):
starting to birth some real sort of superstars like roy
A Cuff. Yeah, and Mini Pearl came along in Yo.
And she's just as closely linked to that period of
the um the Grand Old Opry as roy Acuff is
for sure. Um. I was reading about her, did you
know that whole thing was just a total put on?
That she was like a college educated woman from a

(15:12):
well to do family. It was, it was a character.
I mean, I fell for a Hooklein and sinker. She
was Larry the Cable Guy. Yes, exactly, she was. She
was Larry the Cable Guy prior to Larry the Cable Guy.
But I was like, I know she was in a
commercial that I loved when I was a kid. I
was like, I think it was Spick and Span, and
I looked it up and sure enough, thank you Internet,

(15:34):
there's a two Spick and Span commercial where she shows
up and shows this this lady that she can get
her Linoleum floors back to looking new with spick and span.
It was great. That's funny what hangs in the memory, right,
it really does that. And then my other association with
Mini Pearl is UM that Dead Milkman song Punk Rock
Girl where they'll name their their daughter Mini Pearl. That's

(15:58):
the other, the other Mini Pearl thing. UM. So there's
a couple of ways you can get on stage and
play at the Grand Old Opry Um. Most people are
invited to play as a guest just on a random
individual show, and that's a great, great honor. Uh. Then
they have there I mentioned the cast earlier, they have
what's what's called members. They're the cast. They're these regular

(16:22):
performers who are invited to become a member UM. I
think publicly. Once you're invited, an existing member will ask
you to join them live on the air during a broadcast.
Kind of is the big coming out party, I guess UM.
And being a member is UM it's a really big deal. Like, uh,

(16:45):
they take a lot of time to add members. They
only add maybe a couple of year. There's there's I
think sixty five current active members I'm sorry, sixty total,
uh nine of which no longer perform or officially retired, okay,
but they're still they're still considered members of their considered

(17:05):
I think you kind of have to pass away to
officially be taken off, unless you run a foul, which
we'll talk about that as well. I got you. Um So, yeah,
there's uh, the there's basically, I mean, to become a
member of the Grand Old Opry is an enormous honor,
Like it's a really big deal. There are people who,

(17:27):
um are just huge country superstars that are not members
of the Grand Old Operate. They might be invited to
come play a show or something like that, but they're
not members of the Grand Old Operation if you remember
the Grand Old Opry. Basically, the impression I have is
that you're considered the the uh the guard of country
music is one way to put it in a really

(17:49):
confusing way. Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of
things that go into it, and I mean it sounds
like it's you know, they talk about you being successful
and you being connected it and you being committed. That's
a big part of it, and we'll get to that
in a second. But it sounds like there's not just
sort of one set of criteria where like, hey, if

(18:10):
you have so many number one hits or so much
music sales, it's like a bunch of stuff decided by people. Yeah,
subjectively and objectively, right. I think also in some cases
it's a it's a judgment that's passed on your style
of country music. Like they might not like it at
a time. Maybe I think it sounds too poppy back
in the day, they might have thought it sounded to

(18:31):
rock and roll. Um. Like there's a there's a definite like,
like you said, subjectivity to it as well as objectivity. Um.
But if you if you do get that that um,
that invitation, um, you're expected to come play twelve shows
a year, twelve Saturday nights, I should say a year, um,
to maintain your your membership. Uh. And I think also

(18:56):
you have to sell cookies in the February to help
raise funds. Is that true? No, it wouldn't surprise me. Man,
that's the girls Scouts. No, it would not surprise me
because they they do expect a lot of participation, and
not just on show nights. They expect you to go
to a lot of shows. They expect you just to

(19:18):
kind of be there a lot. Um. I think in
the fifties and sixties. Uh, they were at I mean
from its inception up into the fifties and sixties, they
required twenty six shows a year, which is a man,
that's like half your weekend shows basically, yea tour. Yeah,
if you want to go tour, that's that's a significant

(19:39):
amount of time that you have to dedicate. And they
finally knocked it down to twelve, which is still pretty significant,
especially if you don't live in Nashville, but uh, it's
that's much more manageable than twenty six, you know. Yeah,
they knocked it down to twenty and nineteen sixty four
after they bought at six and then sixty four. It's

(20:00):
I think in two thousand and they finally knocked it
down to twelve. Oh really, it took that long. Huh,
took a while. So over the years, the membership of
the Grand Old Opry has been you know, there's a
lot of people that that you would expect who were members,
like everybody from roy A Cuff, as we said earlier
in Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass, Um, Petty Kleine,

(20:24):
Hank Williams was for a while, Johnny Cash, Barbara Mandrell, Reba.
Reba's actually playing what's the date today? Do you know?
Is it the twenty two? Yes, Reba's playing the Grand
Old Opry tonight. Isn't that cool? I love it? And
listen to you going with just the one name. Oh
it's Reba we're talking about here. I watched your TV

(20:46):
show pretty frequently, so I'm on a first name basis
with her. I never saw it was a good It
actually was good. She was cute. Yeah, she was a good,
good actress for a non actor. She's a good act
sorry for she was a good actor for a non actor. Um,
and she really I think I really came to appreciate
Reva first and Tremors. Oh, I loved her in that.

(21:07):
And we can say that because we were bad actors
for non actors exactly. Yes, we know, we know what
we're talking about. Who else these days Randy Travis, Allison Kraus,
Alan Jackson, Brad Paisley. I think Keith Urban, Darius Rucker,
and Blake Shelton and most recently, the most recent edition
is Lady A which used to be Lady Annabellum until

(21:30):
the George Floyd murder and ensuing protests. They were like no,
we're gonna drop in and a Bellum, which hats off
to them, but they went to Lady A Um, which
they're probably like this coolest, sounds good, But then the
Seattle Blue singer Lady A, who's been performing for thirty years,
is like, I'm not really okay with this, but I'm

(21:51):
not sure that they're changing their name again anytime soon.
That's right after you are invited to perform, now that
you get your aim on the wall. And I think
it was Blake Shelton who actually started the new tradition
of hanging his own plaque on the wall because he
was so excited. Apparently he grabbed the plaque and went

(22:12):
and did it himself during the ceremony, which is which
is fairly adorable. I think I don't know much about
the guy, but I like an excitable feller. Yeah he's
married to Um. Yeah, that lady that's there. He's not
a Hall of Back girl. By the way, was that
was that one of their songs? Yeah, that was one

(22:33):
of her songs. I don't know B A N A
N A yes, something like that. I have a rhythm.
Well you sang this episode that's all I wanted, so
um should we take another break? Is it time? Yeah,
let's take another break and we'll talk about just how
this institution has evolved over the years. Okay, Chuck, So

(23:18):
you you mentioned how the institutions evolved over the years,
and you can't really be like the the ongoing voice
or foundation or home of genre of music if the
genre of music keeps evolving and you don't you know,
but there's like kind of this tension for the Grand
Old Opry as well, because it is this institution. It

(23:41):
can't and shouldn't just go chasing every trend. It needs
to kind of wait and see see if there if
you know, some change that comes along is real change,
um all while protecting like the musical roots of this
very proud tradition of country Western music. It's not a
really enviable position should and you know, luckily they've had

(24:02):
what seems to be a pretty good succession of members
and management who have done a fairly good job of
overseeing that task. Um. But being an institution, it's also
been kind of ice Bergean and its movements of like change,
especially when a major change comes along to music, like

(24:24):
when rock and roll came along. Yeah, I mean, you
start out as folk music and how down music and
bluegrass stuff and then honky tonk stuff, and eventually the
electric guitar is going to make an appearance. And they
had a decision to make because drums and horns and
electric guitars were all banned for many years, and I

(24:46):
think electric guitar even was allowed before drums and horns
were allowed. And all it takes is kind of one
performer to break the mold for people to like it,
which is key, and then for the management to say,
you know, maybe we need to start letting drum sets
in here, because it was that that slap bass is
kind of what kept that percussive time for that kind

(25:08):
of music for many years, and drums were just you know,
it's not something they wanted in there. Yeah. Um, So
you can imagine when rock and roll comes in and
people like Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis come around,
it's a big deal and they didn't want any part
of it. I think Elvis was invited to play once,
but he certainly was never invited for membership. And then

(25:31):
Jerry Lee Lewis um he got a little revenge in
that he was not treated He felt like he was
sort of shunned by Nashville in the country music establishment,
even though he sort of did some country western, mostly
kind of blazing rock and roll piano tunes. And so
when he finally played there, I think in ninety three,

(25:54):
they said, all right, you can come and play. We're
inviting you, but don't play any rock and roll. And
he said, okay, just put me up on that stage,
got up on the stage and said, let me tell
you something about Jerry Lee Lewis, Ladies and gentlemen, I'm
a rock and rolling country in Western rhythm and blues
singing m f R yeah, mother lover, yes. And they

(26:16):
did not take kindly to that. Uh. The only reason
he wasn't banned is because the audience loved it. I
think have you ever read The Strange and Mysterious Death
of Mrs Jerry Lee Lewis from Rolling Stone In You
should read it. It's very eye opening and like one
of those I think it was a disgrace Land episode.

(26:37):
I'm sure that, yeah, but it's like kind of jarring.
How you know, if you're super super famous, just the
different kind of treatment you get, even you know, in
a in a murder investigation, you know, Yeah, I'm glad
that's all changed. Yeah, I know the seventies are crazy, um,
but they they the fact that they didn't kick Jerry

(27:01):
Lee Lewis out or allowed him to come back and
play some more. I don't think he was ever Um
he was never a member, right, No, he was just
abody to play, okay, but he was he was invited
back again. Was because he rocked that place that hard, apparently,
but there have been other people who were kicked out,
um for far less than that, for what then what

(27:22):
he did? Um? So there is kind of this this
view from the outside of like what what what's the
decision making process here? In some of these cases, some
are just obvious, other ones are like I'm not sure
about that one. Yeah, there was Um well, these the
Birds weren't kicked out. But in the sixties with a
hippie counterculture, obviously that was going to be an issue

(27:44):
with Nashville because they had sort of a no long
hair's rule. But they did invite the Birds because they
were that kind of new brand of country rock and
the crowd hated them. Um. So I don't think they
came back, but it wasn't like they were kicked out
they were were less voted out by you know, lack
of popular demand. I'll bet that was not a comfortable show. No,

(28:07):
I'm sure that didn't feel very good. But David Crosby
had plenty of drugs too, right. So Hank Williams was
very famously kicked out. He was a member of the
Grand Old Opry Um and he was kicked out in
nine two, just a few months before he died. Um.
He was kicked out because he kept missing shows. So

(28:29):
he missed two shows in one weekend because he was
off drunk um and they were like you, you're just
we can't have this any longer. Um, I think we
should do a whole episode on him someday. Yeah, sure.
I mean, anyone who kind of drinks himself to get
to death before their thirties intriguing at the very least,
very sad story, Yeah, agreed. And then Johnny Cash he

(28:51):
very famous. He was kicked out of the Opery as well.
He met his wife, June Carter Cash when they were performing,
both of them separately at the Grand Old Opery one night,
and he became a member for years until nineteen sixty
five when he um went nuts and destroyed like some
lighting equipment because as Mike wasn't working during a rehearsal um,

(29:14):
which is a little diva ish, I think you could
make the case. And they said, um, bite your tongue,
and they said, uh that he uh, he could not
be a member of the opera anymore. And they kept
them that way until I think the eighties, when he
was finally invited back as a member. They said, Okay,
we think you've probably cooled down enough. Well, he got

(29:36):
sober and I think saw the air of his ways
and made a bunch of big changes for the better
in his life. I suspect that it was when he
um covered that nine inch Nail song that the Grand
Ol Operay was like, this is the bomb, you can
come back. That's a great great He does some great
covers on those albums. Yeah, very sad stuff. I think

(29:57):
in seventy three, the was a woman named Skeeter Davis
who had that really big hit the End of the World,
great song um, and she got a little political. Earlier
in the day, she was at a shopping mall and
saw some cops arresting some Uh. There were some church
workers sort of witnessing and doing their thing at the
shopping mall, which I guess you weren't allowed to do.

(30:19):
So the cops, uh either arrested them or at least
took them out of there. And she got on stage
that night and said, this is something I really should share. Uh.
I didn't ask our manager if I could say this,
but they've arrested fifteen people just for telling people that
Jesus loves them, and that really burdened my heart. She
was a fourteen year member and lost her membership and
was banned reinstated a few years later, but actually was

(30:45):
it yeah, one year later, but this was I was like,
why would they do that? It seems like the Grand
Opera you would be way down with that message. But
the cops were not happy, and the police complained, and
so they had to maintain that them blue line you know,
got you. They had to back the blue back the blue,
that's what it is and then chuck. In two thousand one,
there was a really UM I would say famous case

(31:07):
when Nico Case was banned. She wasn't a member of
the opery though I don't believe, but she was an
invited UM performer, right, Yeah, she played not in the
operay house. It's sort of the stepping stone is to
be invited to play the party plaza outside and she
was playing in the sweltering heat and asked for some water.

(31:28):
They couldn't get it to her, asked if she could
take a break. They wouldn't let her take a break,
so she took her shirt off and finished the set
in her bra and they banned her for life. The
only person to date has been banned for life right
because she showed her braw yeah, which is um, you know,
I think I think she could totally turn this on

(31:49):
them now, uh, And they would probably react pretty quickly
to get her back in there and invite her if
she you know, if you were like you weren't weren't
taking care of a woman's health on stage or a
performers health on stage by giving them, you know, letting
them hydrate themselves, then I think they would be like,
oh yeah, yeah, yeah, so back out here quick. Yeah.

(32:12):
And she said later in an interview that like this
was not a stunt or anything, like she was about
to have heat stroke and this is how she was
coping with it. That she wasn't you know, trying to
be cool or anything, or she said she getting kicked
out of the Opery. Wasn't punk rocket, wasn't good or
nothing good came of it. But she did say that
they told her that she'd never played Nashville again, and

(32:34):
she certainly has played Nashville, including at the Ryman a
number of times too, which is kind of, um, good,
good comeback. Yeah. I actually just bought tickets to go
see her in uh, the wine country in California in August,
did a winery, very chic. Cannot wait. I can imagine

(32:54):
she's one of my favorites. I've seen her a bunch
of times. It'll probably be a nice small show. Huh. Yeah,
it's like, you know, outdoors of the winery, sipping wine,
listening the cocase. That's awesome. Uh really can't wait. But
she's you know, she has a reputation for sort of
that outsider sort of punk rock attitude, and I think
that's why they thought. Some people might have thought she

(33:14):
was trying to just stick it to the Grand Old
Opry and she's like, no, that's not the case. So
we mentioned the Rieman, and obviously the Rieman's still around. Um,
but the Grand Old Opry moved from the Rheman in
nineteen seventy four, right, and to um this this new venue,
the Grand Old Opry House that it's still in today.
And it was a big deal when they moved because

(33:37):
they've been in the Rheman for like thirty years. They
started to hit like their peak of their popularity, which
is plateaued really high since that time. UM. And they
had their last show in March of nineteen seventy four.
And I read this really great article from the New
York Times of All Things UM from nineteen seventy four

(33:57):
by Suzanne Freeman. It's called opry Land is a Dream
to believe in and it's about, you know, the Grand
Old Opry and what it meant to her growing up
as a kid in Pennsylvania and UM, how she ended
up going to this last show and what it was like. UM.
But as they moved to the opery Land, one of
the reasons they moved was because of this amusement park.
It was a radio show that started out playing Hodowns

(34:21):
in the headquarters of an insurance building in Nashville, now
had its own Disney design theme park built in and
this huge person cushioned seat, air conditioned venue UM to
to basically celebrate the how far this this thing had come.

(34:43):
It was pretty amazing. Um doubled almost doubled in size
from the Rieman. Uh, and they took a little bit
of the tradition with them. They cut out the six
ft circle they're at center stage with the artist performs
from the Riemans floorboards, moved it over to the Grand
Old Opry. How us opened it big with Richard Nixon
on March four, who performed. He actually played the dulcimer

(35:08):
in the piano, sang Happy Birthday to his wife. The
Rheman very sadly fell on hard times after that and
hard to believe, but kind of like our our fabulous
Fox Theater here in Atlanta was actually being talked about
being demolished in the seventies and the eighties, and they were,
like the Fox, a lot of fundraisers and a lot

(35:30):
of people getting involved to save the Rieman. And now it's,
you know, one of the oldest and still one of
the most premier venues which still hosts the Grand ol
Opery from November to January every year. They hold it
at the Rieman. Okay, that's pretty cool, and it's called
Opery at the Rieman, but it's still the Grand ol
Opry every Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday, February through October. It's

(35:52):
still at the Grand ol Opry House. And um, yeah,
they don't miss those shows. Man. There was a flood.
Cumberland River flooded in two thousand ten. Yeah, and uh,
it really damaged. Like they had to do a lot
of repairs. They even had to pull out that center
circle and that was really damaged and they restored that,
got it going again and kept that traditional alive. So

(36:13):
one of the things about the amusement park that I
was looking up is that it was closed in and
I was reading an article about it where they were
saying like it was just a bad decision that this
thing was closed, because this amusement park was lucrative. Basically
from the day it was opened to the day it
was closed, it made money. It wasn't ever, it wasn't

(36:34):
underwater until that flood. Um, but it was replaced in
ninety seven by a mega mall, and even in people
knew malls were starting to go away. So that was
a really bad move to begin with. And then I
found out the person who ran UM, the company that
owned the amusement park, also at the same time decided

(36:57):
that it would be best for their company to start
ordering the market on online Christian music websites during the
height of the dot com bubble, just before it burst.
And um, this was the same person that decided to
to shut down opery Land USA and replace it with
them all. So it was not not one of the
great decisions of all time. But I thought this that

(37:18):
was super interesting, that it was fine. It just was
taken away from everybody. Luckily there's still Dollywood, so don't panic. Yeah,
I mean Dolly partner smart. She started playing the Grand
ol Opry when she was ten years old. She saw
the riding on the wall with opery Land, and UH said,
why don't I start my own uh amusement country music

(37:42):
amusement park. And I don't know if that helped drive
opery Land out of business or I guess you said
they were still doing okay, But yeah, no, it was good.
I saw another there was another article that basically said
the um opery Land made more money than Dollywood. It's
last like month in exist since Wow, yeah, I'm gonna

(38:02):
have it was just a bad move. How old I
was when I we took that trip. That was us
going to apry Land, the Grand all Opry House, doing
that stuff. That was a quintessential Bryant family vacation in
the nineteen seventies. That's awesome. Your dad was just see
being with people the whole time, totally see being with people.
We probably camped because I know he didn't stay in

(38:23):
a hotel because I've literally never stayed in a hotel
with my family before. Uh yeah, dude, I didn't stay
in a hotel till I was except for like church trips,
till I was like out of college. You were like
tiny shampoo. It was weird, like they give you this stuff.
It's funny, man. I love the Chuck Bryant saga. You know,

(38:46):
it's interesting and not too far from years. I think
it's something about growing up in that time period. That's uh.
We we have some common DNA. Yeah, I stayed in
hotels though we had hotels. Well yeah, the street we
were camping campers, and we were also, Uh, I didn't
have a ton of money and we're also kind of cheap.
I got you, I got you all those things combined

(39:06):
to enter the campground. Um, what else? You got anything else?
On Grand Old Opry And I got nothing else? Just
check out my w S and playlist hour July one,
five pm Central. Very nice and hopefully this, uh it
fattened up the WSM people to get you that backstage
tour of the Rheyman, Yeah, eman, he even mentioned doing

(39:30):
introductions at the Opery House, and I was like, dude,
come on, wow, Like you don't want to confuse and
repulse the fine people of Nashville, So okay, you don't
have anything else about the Opery. I don't have anything
else about the Opry. I would say, go forth and
listen to the Grand Old Operate. It's still broadcast. Um,
this is how cutting edge it is. It's now on YouTube.

(39:52):
But you can also go listen to WSM online every
Saturday night. And uh, they probably broadcast the Tuesday and
Friday night ones too, but definitely Saturday. And since I
said definitely Saturday, it's time for a listener mail. I'm
gonna call this nearly corrected but not Oh I know
this one. Hey guys, I'm Sean. I'm a Chinese dude

(40:13):
living in Milan, Italy. Uh, and I just listened to
short stuff Chinatown, interesting and informative. And by the way,
I picked this one because at another listener right in
it was not too kind about this correction, and it
turns out I was right. So that's why I'm reading it.
Probably because of the different pronunciations in Mandarin, Chinese, which
I speak, Cantonese Chinese, and English. I thought Chuck was

(40:34):
wrong wen you mentioned the first formally recognized Chinatown was
called Little Canton at the time, and then today Canton
is known as Little Gong Jao. Okay, so that Gong
Joo is that it? I know I said it correctly
the first time, but I looked it up recently. So
just whatever I said the first time, I'm pretty sure

(40:55):
it was Gong Joongong Joe Man. I hope it is going,
but go ahead. What matters is that you got it
the first time, yeah, and screwed it up the second time.
That's what Billy Joel always says. Get it right the
first time. That's the main thing. Okay, He's somebody to
model to follow, base your life on. So I mean, man,

(41:17):
why are you bagging on Billy Joel? Hey? I know
the music man, but um piano man, I think I
should have stopped talking about five minutes ago, Okay. So
immediately started writing a Haha, you're wrong email to point
out that Chuck was wrong, but after finishing, right before
clicking Cind, I had a gut feeling I should do
a little bit more research. Luckily I did. It turned

(41:39):
out the joke is actually on me. I was wrong
and Chuck was right all along. So thank you much, Uh,
Sir Chuck and Sir Josh, you two American gentleman taught
a Chinese boy lesson about his own country. Because, by
the way, Josh, you pronounced it super accurately. This is
how you pronounce it, Guang Jao, Guang Jo, good job.
Thank you. One last secret before finishing the email, I

(42:01):
don't like wearing headsets nor earphones. I always play podcast
on my Google Home when I am cooking eating twing dishes.
Sometimes it's so noisy when I'm cooking and doing dishes
that I can't hear it very well. So your show
is one of only two podcasts that I actually listened
to with headsets that I don't like. I don't want
to miss anything. High praise. The other one is Crime
Junkie Okay, Hi praise indeed, yeah, we'll take it. Uh.

(42:25):
And that is sincerely your big if not biggest Chinese fan,
Sean Sean. Thank you very much, Sean. I appreciate that,
and I think it's pretty sweet that you wrote into
not correct us, especially when somebody was mean to Chuck Gosh.
I don't know how that one slipped past me. You know. Um, Well,
if you want to get in touch with us and

(42:46):
be nice, even if it is a correction, you don't
have to be a jerk about it. You can wrap
it up, spank it on the bottom, and send it
off to Stuff podcast at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff
you should know it is production of I heart Radio.
For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the i heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your

(43:07):
favorite shows. H M.