Nashville, also Nashville-Davidson, city, is the capital of Tennessee, United States. Since 1963 Nashville and Davidson County have had a single government. Besides being the seat of the state government, the city is a commercial, manufacturing, educational, and tourist hub and the country's main centre for performing and recording country-and-western music. Financial, insurance, and transport services are also important. Products include motor vehicles, aerospace equipment, printed materials, processed foods, clothing, and footwear. Places of interest in and around Nashville, are the State Capitol (1855), the Georgian-style Governor's Mansion, Belle Meade Mansion (1853) and Fort Nashborough, a replica of the city's original settlement. More famous are the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum and Ryman Auditorium, until 1974 the site of the Grand Ole Opry country-music performances. The city is the seat of Belmont University (1951), David Lipscomb University (1891), Fisk University (1867), Free Will Baptist Bible College (1942), Meharry Medical College (1876), and the Tennessee State University (1912).

The Nashville area, used as a hunting ground by Cherokee, Chickasaw, and Shawnee peoples, attracted French fur traders, who about 1710 established a trading post, which became known as French Lick. In 1779, a group of pioneers, some from North Carolina, built Fort Nashborough, named after the American War of Independence general Francis Nash. In 1784 the community was renamed Nashville. Situated at the northern terminus of the Natchez Trace, a major commercial road, Nashville was, by the early 19th century, a bustling river port for shipping cotton. In 1843 the city was made the permanent state capital, and in the 1850s it became a rail centre. After the Civil War, Nashville increased its trade, and in the 1920s it became famous for country-and-western music (the Grand Ole Opry radio broadcasts from Nashville have been on the air since 1925). Beginning in the 1930s, the city's industrial development was spurred by the availability of cheap electric power produced by the Tennessee Valley Authority. Population (1980) 455,651; (1990) 510,784.

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