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From its small start, the Grand Ole Opry has become an American treasure, and anyone designing a Nashville vacation knows, the Opry is Nashville’s number one attraction. It began as a live music radio broadcast in 1925, and just continued active and in full swing. And today it has outlasted thousands of other broadcasts to be the oldest continuous radio program in America. It is also heard on XM Radio, and is televised Saturday nights on the Great American Country cable channel.
The Grand Ole Opry initially started out just five years after commercialized radio programming was initially started out in the USA. In 1925, a radio station was established in Nashville by an insurance company (National Life and Accident) hoping that this new programming medium could be exploited to pitch insurance policies. Country music fans are acquainted with the station’s call letters, WSM, but most don’t remember that WSM stood for the company’s motto: “We Shield Millions.”
National Life employed one of the nation’s favorite radio broadcaster, George D. Hay, as WSM’s program chief. On November 28, 1925, the 30 year old Hay described himself “The Solemn Old Judge” and set up the program that would come to be known as the WSM Barn Dance.
George D. Hay’s weekly Barn Dance broadcasts were soon tremendously popular, and in 1927 he renamed it the Grand Ole Opry. Hordes of fans filled up the studio as they arrived to see the stars, so National Life built a bigger hall with a capacity of 500. In 1932, WSM grew their transmitter strength to 50,000 watts and most of the USA and Canada could hear the Opry on Saturday nights.
The fans kept growing, so in 1934 the Opry moved from its station studio to the Hillsboro Theater (now operated as the Belcourt Theater). The crowds kept growing, so next the Opry moved to the Dixie Tabernacle in East Nashville, then to the War Memorial Auditorium next to the State Capitol.
In 1943, still requiring more room, the Opry moved to the Ryman Auditorium, where it remained until 1974, when it moved to its new home, the 4,400 capacity Grand Ole Opry House, neighbor to the Opryland Hotel, where you can see performances several times each week, except for several weeks in winter when the Opry goes back to the Ryman Auditorium.
On the stage of the new Opry House, there’s a six-foot circle of darkish, oak wood; it’s lustrouus but conspicuously time worn. Cut from the stage of the Opry’s renowned previous home base, the Ryman Auditorium, this circle of oak gives freshman fans and veterans alike the chance to play on the very spot that one time supported Patsy Cline, Ernest Tubb, Uncle Dave Macon, and others.
There have been lots of changes at the Opry over the decades – its members, its music, and its home. But that dark oak circle stays, a message for every singer who stands on it that they are part of something that’s much bigger than themselves, and wherever they may go they are connected to the legends who came before.
The Opry’s performers and music have defined C&W in the USA. Hundreds of musicians have performed as members through history. Being rewarded with membership in the Grand Ole Opry, country’s most longstanding “Hall of Fame”, is to be selected as one of the most elite stars of country music.
Membership in the Opry is not just attained, but must be sustained with frequent performances during the artist’s lifetime.
Nowadays you can experience the Grand Ole Opry in to a greater extent than any time before. There are Tuesday Night Opry shows from April through December. A two-hour radio show, can be picked up in 200 markets across America. Just like country & western stars of old grew up tuning their radio to listen to the Opry, future day generations of Opry stars can catch it on satellite radio or the internet.
Wherever they’re hearing, those rising Opry stars some day will assume their position standing on that celebrated round piece of oak.
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