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The Feng Shui of Music and Nashville

Sarah Mcallister • Oct 05, 2021

Did the landscape of Tennessee and the design of Nashville create 'Music City'?

While much of Feng Shui technique is pretty complex, and involves crunching hexagrams, flying the numbers of the ‘stars’ and analysing clashes and combinations of stems, branches and five element dynamics, some of the Form School Feng Shui requires a subliminal understanding of how the form affects the chi… there were times in the past that I didn’t quite understand some of the things my Feng Shui Grandmaster was pointing out to us - like, what is he smoking?! But after a few years it started to click a little more. Energy doesn’t work with the logical and rational part of the mind, but with the deeper intelligence and subconscious. Energy awareness requires intuition and a sort of 'blinkstinct' speed.... What are your immediate thoughts & impressions that flash into your greater mind, rather than your intellectual mind? 

Light Meander
When I first saw the artwork 'Light Meander' it was clear that it was the river Cumberland that runs through Nashville. Immediately, it struck me that it looked like the top of a guitar, complete with tuning pegs! The river loops in a particularly tight way, unlike other meandering rivers in London for example that are looser, the Cumberland has larger loops that look like the waist of a fiddle then they loop around very tightly, just like frets and tuning pegs! Since water is such a powerful carrier of energy, this water form will definitely create a particular resonance. 

Being somewhat of a Feng Shui detective, I was now intrigued and went looking for more clues... would the countryside have a lot of small smooth hills indicating musical talent? What was the town formation like - did that also look like a fiddle or a guitar? People will say this is cognitive bias, but I also reverse engineer the opposite questions to make sure what I am seeing is as accurate as possible. 

The original map of Nashville
The original map of Nashville town from 1864 shows the bend in the river looking like the belly of a fiddle or guitar and the first town streets in a grid that looks like the fretboard and then the neck of a guitar! 

Rolling Hills Foster Musical Talent
Curiously, the music centre was then built with the shape of a guitar on the green rooftop and with an undulating roof to reflect the rolling hills of the surrounding area. Wales in the UK also has a lot of rolling hills and famous singers. There are areas of China that produce top opera singers. All these areas have rounded and undulating hillsides. Think of it a bit like inverse acoustics - the chi of the land travels and rolls in smooth formations like sound waves....  You can see from the topographical map that Nashville sits in a basin and is surrounded by smooth rolling domed hills. 

AT&T Guitar building
And the top of the AT&T building definitely looks like the top of an electric guitar, further reflecting the musical nature of the city.  This is a more modern addition to the city of course, but definitely is tastefully done and quite subtle. 

There is even a motel with a not so subtle guitar shaped pool that I saw advertised! For sure, there may now be overkill on guitar motifs in Nashville, but isn't it just really interesting that the shape of the river subliminally looks like a guitar or fiddle?! 

I would love to know whether the original tribes in this area, who lived here before the settlers created a town, were particularly musical or not?

I hope you have found this interesting. 

Sarah x


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