Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum

The Country Music Hall of Fame was established in 1961 as an institution for honouring the music's foundational figures; its first inductees were Jimmie Rodgers, Hank Williams, and Fred Rose, each chosen posthumously. The original building opened in 1967 on Music Row in a circular structure designed to reference the bass clef and guitar sound holes of country music's instrument tradition. By the turn of the century the collection had outgrown the building; the museum relocated in 2001 to a purpose-built facility on Fifth Avenue South, a structure whose architecture incorporates references to piano keys, radio towers, and the tailfin aesthetic of mid-century America's commercial culture.

The collection is vast and specific. Among its most striking objects: Elvis Presley's gold-plated 1960 Cadillac Fleetwood limousine, one of the most photographed automobiles in the world; handwritten draft lyrics by Hank Williams; Patsy Cline's performance costumes; Johnny Cash's guitar; recording equipment from historic Nashville studios. The archive holds more than 2.5 million items including recordings, photographs, film, and documents spanning more than a century of American vernacular music. The museum also operates RCA Studio B on nearby Music Row as a satellite facility.

The Hall of Fame rotunda contains bronze medallions for each inductee set into curved walls, read in the order of their election. The weight of the list — Williams, Cline, Carter Family, Monroe, Presley, Cash, Nelson, Parton — makes the room feel like something between a library and a reliquary. The museum has expanded multiple times since opening and now occupies a full city block. It is the most comprehensive archive of country music history in existence.