The Big House — Allman Brothers Band Museum, Macon

The Big House at 2321 Vineville Avenue in Macon, Georgia, was the rambling Tudor revival home where members of the Allman Brothers Band lived communally in the early 1970s — a domestic situation that reflected both the band's collective ethos and the specific social world of the Southern rock community they were helping create. The house was rented by the band and their families and associates from around 1970, and during the period when they were recording At Fillmore East (1971) and Eat a Peach (1972), it functioned as something between a home, a rehearsal space, and a community centre for the extended Allman Brothers family.

Duane Allman died in a motorcycle accident in Macon on 29 October 1971, less than a year after the Fillmore East recordings that had made the band's reputation. He was 24. Bassist Berry Oakley died in a remarkably similar accident — also on a motorcycle, also in Macon — almost exactly a year later, on 11 November 1972. Both graves are at Rose Hill Cemetery in Macon, a short distance from the Big House. The double loss within thirteen months of two of the band's founding members, coming at the moment of their greatest commercial success, gave the Allman Brothers story a particular weight of tragedy that has shaped their legacy.

The Big House opened as the Allman Brothers Band Museum in 2010 and houses an extensive collection of memorabilia, instruments, photographs, and personal effects from the band's history. It is open Thursday through Sunday; admission is charged and guided tours are available. Macon, Georgia — 'the Soul of Georgia', as it has been branded — has an extraordinary concentration of music heritage, also including the Georgia Music Hall of Fame and Otis Redding's grave at Round Oak. The Big House is the primary destination for Allman Brothers pilgrims.