Music: Hoedown on a Harpsichord

Behind frosted glass doors in a ramshackle former Masonic lodge building in Nashville, Tenn., sit the song peddlers. Their product, proclaimed in gilt letters on the door, is variously billed as "Wonder Music" or "Surefire Music" or "Tenn-Tex Music," but in the industry it is known simply as C. & W. Country and Western. Last week, to the planeloads of disk jockeys descending on Nashville for the ninth annual National Country Music Festival, C. & W. seemed surefire indeed. Its demise has often seemed near,...

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