Nashville’s Bluebird Cafe closed its doors on March 13th, 2020, another music venue unable to operate during the pandemic. But the tiny listening room’s case was even more acute than some clubs: The Bluebird, where budding songwriters try out new material right in the center of the fans, is built on intimacy.
After 16 months, the Bluebird Cafe announced its reopening. The iconic club, located in a nondescript strip mall southwest of downtown and introduced to a national audience by its inclusion in the TV drama Nashville, will host its first show with a ticketed audience on July 16th.
“After a long and challenging year and a half, we are ecstatic to announce that The Bluebird Cafe’s doors will soon be opening and we will once again have music filling our room!” read a post on the venue’s Instagram, tagged with #BluebirdisBack.
The July 16th early-show round features songwriters Joel Shewmake, Annie Mosher, and Jason Matthews. The late show includes Thom Schuyler, Fred Knobloch, Jelly Roll Johnson, and Tony Arata, who wrote Garth Brooks’ hit “The Dance.”
The Bluebird Cafe’s president and GM Erika Wollam Nichols talked to Rolling Stone about the club’s uncertain future last year during the early days of the pandemic. “If the Bluebird hadn’t been a part of Nashville the television show, I don’t know where we would be right now. We were very fortunate to have that. It allowed us to sell merchandise, which is great for our bottom line when you have such a tiny room,” Wollam Nichols said.
A documentary about the 90-seat venue, titled Bluebird, was released in 2019 and featured interviews and performances by Garth Brooks and Taylor Swift.