I spent a few hours in Memphis, TN this week and was moved by a couple of the places I visited. One was the Stax Studio Museum and the other was the Lorraine Motel. This blog post will be focusing on the famous Stax Studio. Stax's artists have been well known to me but I didn't realize the diversity of talent that lived around this Memphis neighborhood. Aretha Franklin, Maurice White, David Porter, Memphis Slim, Booker T, Steve Cropper, Donald Dunn, Johnnie Taylor, Rufus and Carla Thomas, and Issac Hayes just to mention a few.The Stax Museum has an excellent documentary that showcases some of the artists and the great music that was recorded there. The house band that played on most of the Stax tracks was the group that was also known as Booker T and the MG's. The studio later fell into bankruptcy and was torn down. They have re-built the Stax museum on the same location and even built a reproduction of the studio, complete with sloping floor. Some of the sound equipment in the original studio used to be the sound system for the movie theater that occupied the building before it became Stax's.
I felt like one of the keys to the success of Stax had to be the record shop that resided in the front of the studio. For musicians that couldn't afford to buy a lot of records and only heard music played live at bars, or church, or the radio, this was a major deal. To hear different music from around the world raised the musical bar and inspired their creativity.
The other impression I came away with was that a lot of the music flowed out of the joy and genuine affection the artists had for each other. This enthusiasm came through their playing and the music they created. Black or white it seemed like color was checked at the door when the musicians entered the Stax Studios. Music was the breath of friendship that carried those days in the 60's. The same could be said of a studio located a few blocks away called Sun Studio. Growing up in the south for a lot of people was a mixture of poverty and blessings. Being able to worship with creativity and expressing yourself through song was the ultimate freedom. Gospel music was the cradle of rock and blues and nowhere was that more prevalent than the South. Despite their lack of possessions and even their lack of possibilities, musicians played from the deepest part of their souls and made the music their slave, not the other way around. That is the musical gift from the musicians of Memphis.
