Memphis, explained
A day built around music in Memphis moves between four fixed points — Sun Studio, the Stax Museum of American Soul Music, the Rock ‘n’ Soul Museum and Beale Street — each holding a different piece of the city’s recorded history. None sits within walking distance of the others, so the day is really a … Read more
A sensible first visit to Memphis moves outward from downtown, not toward it. Start at the riverfront and the Beale Street district, take in the civil rights sites while still downtown, then move to Soulsville, Sun Studio and Graceland — in that order, because that is the order the city’s geography puts them in. Working … Read more
A third day in Memphis makes room for what the first two usually skip: a neighborhood taken on its own terms rather than as a stop between landmarks, a museum outside the Beale–Sun–Stax–Graceland core, and either a day trip across the river or unhurried time at a civil rights site that a tighter schedule reduces … Read more
Two days in Memphis works best split by geography, not theme: one day anchored downtown and along the river, covering civil rights history, Beale Street and the South Main Arts District; the other given to Whitehaven and Soulsville for Graceland and Stax, with Midtown in the evening. Both are more compact than they look on … Read more
One day in Memphis is enough to see downtown properly — the National Civil Rights Museum, Beale Street, the Mississippi riverfront — plus one music landmark further out, usually Sun Studio, Stax or Graceland. It is not enough to do all three of those and downtown in the same day without cutting each one short. … Read more
Elvis Week is Graceland’s annual commemoration of Elvis Presley, held around the anniversary of his death on August 16, 1977. It is organized by Elvis Presley Enterprises, the company that operates Graceland, and its central event is the Candlelight Vigil at the Meditation Garden where Presley is buried. Exact dates shift slightly each year, and … Read more
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