Nashville Municipal Auditorium

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The Nashville Municipal Auditorium (informally known locally as Municipal Auditorium or simply Municipal) was the primary indoor sports and concert venue in Nashville, Tennessee from the time of its completion in 1962 until the completion of Nashville Arena (now Gaylord Entertainment Center) in 1996. It remains in use today, though primarily for low-profile gatherings and minor sporting events and concerts.

The concept of a large municipal auditorium was proposed for Nashville in the early post-World War II era, but other municipal priorities took precedence until the late 1950s, when funding was finally arranged. The construction was the object of great curiosity in the Nashville area, in part because it involved the use of a tower crane; many were surprised to learn that this was to be dismantled and not serve as part of the permanent structure's roof support. The Municipal Auditorium marked the last major capital expenditure by the former City of Nashville prior to its merger with Davidson County into the Metropolitan Government of Nashville and Davidson County.

After the 1962 dedication ceremony, the first event held in the auditorium was a week-long gospel meeting conducted by the Church of Christ; this was followed by a rodeo. This pattern of a multiplicity of diverse usages is characteristic of the building's history. It was also frequently used as a venue for rock concerts, especially in the late 1960s and 1970s; a rap concert in the early 1990s turned tragic when there was a mass panic in the basement resulting in a young concertgoer being trampled to death. This building was also the site of Elvis Presley's only Nashville public appearance (although Elvis came to Nashville many times for recording sessions). In recent years, the auditorium has become primarily a venue for concerts, rodeos, motocross rallies, and flea markets.

The auditorium has many drawbacks. Chief among them is its round shape. This makes for poor sightlines for ice hockey and especially for basketball. It is also rather poor acoustically, and lost most of its concert business when other venues were developed in the Nashville area which were better suited to host music events. It also has a relatively low seating capacity; approximately 8,900 is about the limit for hockey, with a few hundred more being accommodated for basketball due to the smaller playing surface, 11,000 or 12,000 can be accommodated for events in which part of the floor is also available for seating such as religious events and concerts.

Despite these shortcomings, over the years the auditorium hosted five minor league ice hockey teams, which eventually led to the NHL's arrival and new arena, and two in basketball. Minor league basketball proved to be very short-lived. The Nashville Stars played only one season and the Music City Jammers failed to make it even quite that long, relocating to Jackson, Tennessee prior to the end of their only season (although while in Jackson, they did win the league's only championship). Additionally, there was (for a brief while) a franchise in the ill-fated women's American Basketball League, the Nashville Noise in 1998. The Noise folded when the league did, about a dozen games into their first season (the league's third).

A list of the minor league hockey teams follows:

Nashville Dixie Flyers (1962-1971)
Nashville South Stars (1981-1983)
Nashville Knights (1988-1995)
Nashville Nighthawks (1995-1996)
Nashville Ice Flyers (1996-1997)

Other events held at the auditorium through the years included high school basketball, an all-star post-season college basketball game between teams representing Tennessee and Kentucky which was contested several times, and, prior to the completion of the Nashville Convention Center in the 1980s, occasional trade shows and fairs. The Memphis Pros of the old American Basketball Association played a few "home" games there. Even indoor USAC midget car racing was held there on occasion; for this usage a 0.1 mile long track consisting of fountain soft drink syrup was laid around the perimeter of the floor. (This event was probably the only one ever to match the noise level attained by tractor pulls and indoor motocross, which have also been staged there.) Several gospel music events have been held there over the years as well. Additionally, the basketball teams of Belmont University played some home games there (in the 2001-2002 season) while the on-campus Curb Event Center was under construction. For many years, the Auditorium was the only indoor venue in Nashville capable of making ice (using an antiquated, ammonia-based process which was obsolete even when the facility was new) and as such hosted many youth hockey events. (These are now conducted in the ice venue by Centennial Park, which also serves as a practice facility for the Nashville Predators.)

The venue has also played host to numerous notable professional wrestling events. World Championship Wrestling, which enjoyed enormous popularity in the area and made Nashville a routine stop, used the building for three of its flagship Starrcade pay-per-view events (1994, 1995, and 1996). Municipal Auditorium was also the home to the first WrestleWar in 1989 and the last of thirty-five Clash of the Champions shows in August 1997. It was the site of the final WCW SuperBrawl in 2001 as well. In 2002, Total Nonstop Action Wrestling initially used the building as the base for its weekly pay-per-view shows, before moving to the much-smaller Tennessee State Fairgrounds Sports Arena.

At one point, Tennessee Titans owner Bud Adams seriously considered the Municipal Auditorium as a venue for his Arena football team, but the playing floor is too small for that sport without a major renovation of the entire facility. (In fact, the ice surface was always considerably short of being a regulation hockey rink. Many older ECHL rinks had such a problem.)

Since the completion of the Gaylord Entertainment Center, the Nashville Municipal Auditorium has been completely refurbished to serve as a secondary venue for events which are not of sufficient appeal to fill the GEC, such as five of the annual men's basketball tournaments of the Ohio Valley Conference (although these have recently returned to the GEC), smaller musical shows, circuses, and similar events. Some of the preliminary and junior events of the 1997 U.S. Figure Skating Championships were held there.

In 2004, the GMA Music Awards was moved to from the Gaylord Entertainment Center when GEC officials were informed that the GEC was unavailable because of potential use by the Predators playoff games.

In September 2005, the Nashville Municipal Auditorium was used as the national staging area for donations of medical supplies and equipment being gathered to benefit the victims of Hurricane Katrina.

References

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