By Ryan Leopold

Today was a day of legends in the living. After making my first waffle in the morning we left the state of Alabama and went to Mississippi. When we pulled into Tupelo, Elvis’ hometown, I didn’t know what to think.  It was as if someone had chosen some shabby shack fitting every Southern stereotype, and set up a museum behind it. I even saw some kids with a big inflatable tube heading to what I assume was a watering hole. They looked like something out of the Forties with their bare feet and highwater khakis. I couldn’t believe this was the home of one of the greatest musicians of all time. None of the area around Elvis’ birth home was very inspiring. It just looked like a run down rural neighborhood. Then I realized that greatness is not an acquired trait but it has to be inherent for someone to see that landscape every day and still have an incredible vision.

outside Elvis' birth home in Tupelo

Tupelo

After lunch in Tupelo, we headed to a musical mecca, Memphis. Our first stop was the rock and roll monument, Sun Studios. I stood where so many achieved greatness. We learned from the tour guide the legacy of Sam Phillips, the founder of Sun Records, as well as his prodigies: Elvis, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, etc.

on a tour of Sun Studios

the microphone used by Elvis

in the recording studio

After reading and learning about the cultural history of the area, we got to experience it as we headed to Beale Street for our free time. The sights and smells were great but it seems that, like everything in Memphis, it is the sound that drives the city. The Blues music that wafted out of every run down restaurant with flashy signs that seemed twice as valuable as the actual building, told the story of the area and people that struck a chord (no pun intended) in a blues lover like me. If eyes are the windows to the soul, I feel that music is the highway to the heart. I have never been able to understand the pure emotion I get from listening to music, especially live, but it is always exhilarating to feel that emotion coursing through me like electricity. I felt that electricity walking on Beale Street.  I felt it at the Smithsonian Rock and Soul museum that we visited and I definitely felt it at night when we got to go to Alfred’s Blues Bar to listen to live rock and roll on the street that helped shape the creation of that art form.  Memphis became a place that I wont forget!

Rock and Soul Museum	dancing at a blues club on Beale Street	Nathan playing onstage
singing along with the live music