New hotels in Midtown & Music Row, Nashville

Music Row is a working district before it is a sightseeing one. Its core is two one-way streets, 16th and 17th Avenues South, which carry the names Music Square East and Music Square West as they cross the neighborhood. Publishers, labels, management offices and studios occupy converted houses and low office blocks there. The first commercially successful studios and music offices opened along 16th Avenue South in 1954, and within a decade the major labels were cutting most of their country records in the area.

Midtown is the wider zone around it: West End Avenue and Broadway running west from downtown, the hospital and university district around Vanderbilt, and the newer towers that have replaced older low-rise buildings over the past ten years. Hillsboro Village sits at its southwestern edge. Five hotels we track have opened across this area since 2017, and they are very different from one another, which is the useful part of the area.

Getting your bearings

The Music Row Roundabout is the easiest landmark. Demonbreun Street, Division Street, 16th Avenue South and Music Square East meet there, and the sculpture called Musica stands in the middle. Beside it, Owen Bradley Park holds a life-size bronze of the producer and publisher seated at a piano. From the roundabout, downtown's Broadway is a straight run northeast, and the street grid south and west of it belongs to the studios.

Distances are modest but not trivial. Lower Broadway is about a mile from most of the hotels below, and Nashville summers make that mile feel longer than it looks on a map. Most visitors walk to dinner in the neighborhood and take a rideshare to the honky-tonks.

Music Row itself

Studio B and the studio blocks

RCA Studio B, at 1611 Roy Acuff Place, was completed in November 1957 for RCA Victor, under Steve Sholes and Chet Atkins. More than 47,000 songs were recorded there, by Eddy Arnold, Roy Orbison, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and the Everly Brothers among others, and Elvis Presley cut more than 200 songs in the room. Dolly Parton had her first session there in October 1967; by her own account she drove a Chevrolet through the building's side wall on the way in, and the repaired patch can still be seen. The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum runs the studio and offers scheduled tours. The Mike Curb Family Foundation bought the building in 2002 and leases it to the museum for one dollar a year.

That arrangement says something about the district. Music Row has been under development pressure for years, and the Music Industry Coalition and other groups work to preserve what is left of its historic buildings. A hotel here is a guest in a place that is partly a museum and partly a business park.

Where the Hall of Fame used to be

The Country Music Association opened its modernist headquarters at the corner of Music Square East and Division Street in 1967, at a cost of $750,000. The Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum was in that building until December 2000 and reopened downtown in May 2001. The old building was later demolished. What stayed behind is the habit of describing Music Row as the place where records are made, while downtown is where they are celebrated.

Hotels on Music Row

Motif on Music Row

Motif on Music Row opened on July 10, 2024, at 50 Music Square West. The site was formerly occupied by the United Artists Tower, a 1974 recording facility built by two members of Elvis Presley's backing group, the Jordanaires. Triumph Hospitality's property has 133 all-suite units, in one-, two- and three-bedroom layouts, and each has a full kitchen. Rates start around $160 a night. Its neighbors on the street include Sony Music Publishing, BMI and ASCAP, along with independent studios and the radio station Lightning 100. After office hours the block is quiet. That suits a producer in town for a week of sessions, or a family that wants a kitchen, and it will disappoint anyone who expects a lobby bar scene.

Sports Illustrated Resorts Nashville Music Row

The building at 1600 McGavock Street is not new. It is a 2016 apartment tower that already had a first life as short-term rentals under Placemakr and WhyHotel before Travel + Leisure Co. bought in and relaunched it as a sports-branded vacation-ownership property in spring 2026. The suites run from studios to two bedrooms and keep their kitchens and in-unit laundry. What changed is the Wyndham Trademark Collection signage and a Trophy Room lounge. Published unit counts vary, and 42 units changed hands in the initial sale, so check availability on the dates you want rather than relying on a headline number.

It stands near Historic RCA Studio B, within walking distance of Vanderbilt and Belmont, about a mile from downtown and The Gulch. Rates start from $80, the lowest of the five, though that is a starting point for a studio and not a promise for a weekend in June.

Midtown and West End

The Conrad Nashville

Conrad Nashville opened on June 29, 2022, in a 234-room tower at 1620 West End Avenue. It anchors one end of Broadwest, a four-acre development that also holds a 21-story office tower and 196 condominiums. When it opened it was among the first purpose-built luxury hotels in a city whose hotels had mostly been boutique conversions or towers around Broadway. Hilton's luxury flag brings the usual expectations, and rates from $255 put it at the top of this group.

The location trades the density of lower Broadway for an office-and-residential corridor. It is closer to Vanderbilt, Belmont and the publishing offices of Music Row than to the tourist strip. For a business traveler with meetings at a label or a hospital, that is the point.

Hotel Fraye Nashville Midtown

Hotel Fraye opened on August 18, 2022, as the first Curio Collection by Hilton property in Nashville. It has 200 rooms, on Broadway across from Vanderbilt University and less than a mile from the university's medical center. Eagle Realty developed it with Greystar and Whitman Peterson, and Concord Hospitality operates it. There is a ground-floor restaurant and, on the seventh floor, a rooftop bar and pool. An adjacent residential building shares some amenities with the hotel, which keeps the immediate neighborhood closer to live-work than to entertainment district.

Rates start from $160. Music Row and its studios are a short walk, while the Country Music Hall of Fame and downtown's honky-tonks are a quick rideshare rather than a walk. Hospital and university travel makes up much of the demand, and the hotel is pitched at it more than at bachelorette weekends.

Hayes Street Hotel

An independent with 105 rooms, six of them king suites, Hayes Street Hotel opened in 2017 at 1909 Hayes Street. It is the oldest hotel we track in the area. It sits at the west end of Midtown, in a residential and office pocket less than a mile from Music Row and from Broadway. Locally run, a few steps away from the corporate towers, and priced from $85, it is the alternative for a visitor who finds the Hilton flags too predictable.

Hillsboro Village and the Vanderbilt edge

Hillsboro Village lies southwest of the hotel cluster, about three miles from downtown by road, and its identity comes from the streetcar. The trolley line ran down Hillsboro Road, also called 21st Avenue, and most of the houses were built between 1910 and 1940. Two groceries and a pharmacy opened along the line in 1920, and the village took shape from there. Hillsboro Road is still its main street, and the Acklen Avenue Post Office sits in the middle of the commercial strip.

The Belcourt Theatre, a non-profit cinema, is the anchor for evenings. Around it are small restaurants and shops, which makes it the neighborhood to walk after dinner without ordering a car. Belmont University grew out of the Acklen estate: the Belmont Mansion was completed in 1853, and the mansion became the central building of the university in 1890. Belmont's Mike Curb College of Entertainment & Music Business sits across Wedgewood Avenue from the far end of Music Row.

None of the hotels we track is inside the village itself, so a stay here means walking in from Midtown or Music Row, or taking a short ride.

Centennial Park

Centennial Park is the large green space two miles west of downtown, across West End Avenue from Vanderbilt. It covers 132 acres. The Parthenon in the park began as the Fine Arts building of the 1897 Tennessee Centennial and International Exposition, and was rebuilt in steel and concrete between 1925 and 1931. Inside, Alan LeQuire's statue of Athena, added in 1990, is dedicated to the women's suffrage movement.

Which hotel for which trip

Someone who is here for the recording business should look at Motif on Music Row first: it has the kitchens for an extended session and the address among the publishers. A group that wants to pay little, and does not mind a lifestyle brand wrapped around a 2016 apartment tower, will find the Sports Illustrated property cheapest.

A traveler with a hospital appointment or a Vanderbilt visit has two sensible choices, the Fraye for its Broadway frontage and the Conrad if the budget runs to luxury. An independent with a quiet street is Hayes Street. Families needing laundry and a kitchen can go to Motif or the Sports Illustrated suites.

For nightlife, none of these five is the right answer. The Gulch, to the northeast, is closer to bars and restaurants, and Downtown Nashville is closer still. Staying in Midtown and taking a rideshare in is a legitimate choice, though it means paying for it every evening.

Neighboring areas

The Gulch is the nearest district with a dense hotel stock and a long list of restaurants, about a mile from Music Row. SoBro is another downtown-side option, and East Nashville is across the Cumberland River. For the full city picture, see Nashville.

Frequently asked questions

What is the newest hotel in Midtown and Music Row?

Sports Illustrated Resorts Nashville Music Row, relaunched in spring 2026 at 1600 McGavock Street. It is a conversion of a 2016 apartment tower, not a new building. The newest ground-up opening among the five is Motif on Music Row, which opened in July 2024.

Is Music Row walkable from downtown Nashville?

Partly. The roundabout at Demonbreun Street is the usual boundary, and from there lower Broadway is roughly a mile. Many visitors walk it in cool weather and take a rideshare in summer or after dark.

Which hotel is closest to Vanderbilt University?

Hotel Fraye Nashville Midtown, on Broadway across from the campus and less than a mile from the medical center. The Conrad Nashville on West End Avenue is also close, and Sports Illustrated Resorts Nashville Music Row is within walking distance of Vanderbilt and Belmont.

Can I tour a recording studio on Music Row?

Yes. RCA Studio B, at 1611 Roy Acuff Place, is run by the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, which offers scheduled tours. Check the museum's calendar before you plan around a date.

Which is the cheapest hotel here?

Sports Illustrated Resorts Nashville Music Row, from $80, followed by Hayes Street Hotel from $85. Those are starting rates and change with the date.