{"id":260702,"date":"2026-06-09T16:12:50","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T16:12:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/260702\/"},"modified":"2026-06-09T16:12:50","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T16:12:50","slug":"born-98-years-ago-today-in-brooklyn-the-juilliard-trained-musician-whose-daughter-founded-this-nashville-staple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/260702\/","title":{"rendered":"Born 98 Years Ago Today in Brooklyn, the Juilliard-Trained Musician Whose Daughter Founded This Nashville Staple"},"content":{"rendered":"

For more than 40 years, the iconic Bluebird Cafe<\/a> has served as a late-night beacon to the restless minds of Nashville\u2019s songwriting scene. Opened in 1982 by Amy Kurland, the 90-seat cafe and music venue has played host to the discovery of artists like Garth Brooks, Kathy Mattea, and Taylor Swift. And much like Hank Jr., Amy is carrying on an old family tradition. Her father, Sheldon \u201cShelly\u201d Kurland\u2014born on this day (June 9) in 1928\u2014was a much-heralded session violinist who also arranged songs for a whole host of prominent country names.<\/p>\n

How Shelly Kurland Helped Shape the \u201cNashville Sound\u201d<\/p>\n

Born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, Shelly Kurland\u2019s father, Samuel, began giving the boy violin lessons when he was just 5 years old.<\/p>\n

His natural musical inclinations and dedicated training helped him win a contest on the popular New York City radio show Major Bowes Amateur Hour.<\/p>\n

After graduating from high school, Kurland attended the prestigious Juilliard School, training as a classical musician. Upon receiving his master\u2019s degree in music, he accepted a teaching position at Cornell University. During that time, he also toured with the Cornell University Trio.<\/p>\n

In 1964, Kurland left the East Coast for Nashville to teach at Peabody College (now part of Vanderbilt University). He arrived just as Music City was on the precipice of a sea change. Producers like Chet Atkins and Owen Bradley were crafting a new \u201cNashville sound\u201d that utilized classical strings in place of the traditional fiddle.<\/p>\n

Soon, Kurland had organized local string players<\/a> into a collective to perform live and on recordings. He dubbed this group \u201cthe Shelly Kurland Strings.\u201d They played on thousands of country music records. Additionally, they won multiple \u201cSuper Picker Awards.\u201d The industry handed those out to the musicians who played on the most number-one records each year.<\/p>\n

In the late 1960s, Kurland resigned from his teaching position to focus on music full time.<\/p>\n

He Worked With All the Big Names<\/p>\n

It may be easier to compile a list of the A-list country musicians with whom Shelly Kurland didn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

His resume includes<\/a> \u201cHalf the Way\u201d by Crystal Gayle, \u201cHappy Birthday Darlin\u2019\u201d and \u201cI May Never Get to Heaven\u201d by Conway Twitty, \u201cDreaming My Dreams\u201d by Waylon Jennings and \u201cI Wouldn\u2019t Have Missed it for the World\u201d by Ronnie Milsap.<\/p>\n

[RELATED: Nashville\u2019s Music Scene: In Photos]<\/a><\/p>\n

Sheldon \u201cShelly\u201d Kurland died in Nashville on January 6, 2010, at age 81.<\/p>\n

Featured image by Daniel Boczarski\/Getty Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For more than 40 years, the iconic Bluebird Cafe has served as a late-night beacon to the restless…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260703,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[101291,98,100,99,1613,9,24,63,101292],"class_list":["post-260702","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-1920s","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-country-music","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-shelly-kurland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260702","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260702"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260702\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260702"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260702"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260702"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}