The Museum is the brainchild of Nashville songwriter Joe Chambers, who also owns a chain of guitar stores in the area. The 30,000sq.ft. complex, located in downtown Nashville close by the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, the Gaylord Entertainment Centre and Ryman Auditorium, includes a 5,000sq.ft performance hall, a 1,100sq.ft. screening theatre, music instruction rooms and a state-of-the-art recording studio.
Renowned audio engineer TC Furlong of the Illinois-based professional audio company, TC Furlong Inc. provided system design and supervised the installation of the Sennheiser manufactured and distributed equipment.
The performance hall offers a full complement of Neumann and Sennheiser microphones. "I put together a typical input list and that's what we went with," says Furlong. The hall has three Neumann KMS 105 MT vocal mics, a wide selection of Sennheiser evolution mics (835, 901, 902, 904, 905, 906, 908B, 912, 914, 935 and 945 models). In addition there are six channels of EW345 G2 super-cardioid handheld wireless microphones with alternate MMD 935 capsules and two channels of EW322 G2 wireless ME4 cardioid lavaliers.
Jeff Alexander, Sennheiser's vice president of sales and marketing says: "The opportunity for Sennheiser to be the official sponsor of the Musicians Hall of Fame is exciting on several levels. First of all, it's about time musicians were recognised for their contributions to the music industry. There are museums dedicated to rock n' roll, country, classical, folk and world music, songwriters and entertainers, but this is first museum to showcase the merits of musicians. It was so natural for Sennheiser to want to sponsor the performance space with the gear musicians use and respect."
The ribbon cutting ceremony, held 9 June, was followed by a two-hour Super Jam that included Vince Gill, Felix Cavaliere, The Original Funk Brothers (Eddie Willis, Uriel Jones, Joe Messina and Bob Babbitt), Will Lee, Danny Seraphine, David Hungate, Brent Mason, Garry Tallent, Wayne Jackson of the Memphis Horns and numerous others. "I was mixing front-of-house, a feed for video and six monitor mixes from the same console," says Furlong. "Fortunately, Bob Bloomfield was on hand to wrangle the stage, which was crucial to the success of the night."
The museum's exhibits will showcase instruments and artifacts of many of the most respected, talented and influential musicians of our time. Chambers has collected artifacts from rock, soul and pop history, making equal space for Detroit, Memphis, Los Angeles and New York. Chambers also plans to begin a school of music with donated instruments and professional instructors that will be aimed at helping under-privileged, school-age children receive free lessons.
(Chris Henry)
