Before moving to Nashville, now Las Vegas-based editorial and portrait photographer Joe Buglewicz did a lot of travel-related work while living in New York City. So when he was contacted by The Wall Street Journal for an assignment documenting the cultural change in The Music City, it was right up his alley. The article demonstrates how Nashville is trying to shed its ‘hillbilly’ reputation.
Joe’s main focus with this assignment was to capture the older, touristy feel of downtown Nashville and contrast it with the trendier spots that are developing around the city. He really got a feel for the culture of a city while working in and amongst the venues:
The shoot days were a lot of fun. I had been to some of the spots before, but overall it felt great embracing that new-to-the-city feeling and trying to make it come through in the images. Towards the end of the assignment, I gathered all the photos and looked for gaps that needed to be filled. The last step was just walking into some extra venues, chatting with owners and managers, and making pictures to fill out the coverage. There was definitely a good amount of planning to begin with, but things really came together naturally.
Joe says that Nashville natives are some of the nicest he has met, and he was blown away by people’s hospitality, openness and willingness to chat while he was out shooting:
The thing I really enjoy about Nashville is its depth. It’s fantastic to enjoy all the culture/change that’s on the surface, but I look forward to digging deeper and finding those unique stories that really define the city. Also Nashville can make a damn fine cup of coffee!