📚 Memphis: Blues, Rock and Roll and a River Economy | 孟菲斯：蓝调、摇滚与河流经济
Memphis is the largest city in the state of Tennessee and one of the state's cultural and economic centres. Built along the Mississippi River, it is known as the "Home of the Blues" and the "Birthplace of Rock and Roll", a reputation that grows directly out of a deep musical heritage and a lively cultural life.
孟菲斯是美国田纳西州最大的城市，也是该州文化与经济重镇之一。它依密西西比河而建，被誉为 "蓝调音乐之都" 与 "摇滚乐之都"，这离不开城市深厚的音乐积淀和蓬勃的文化生活。
1. Memphis at a Glance | 孟菲斯速览
Memphis sits in the south-western corner of Tennessee, on the eastern bluff of the Mississippi River, and serves as the seat of Shelby County. About 630,000 people live inside the city limits, while the wider metropolitan area holds more than 1.3 million residents. It is one of the largest urban centres on the entire Mississippi, and it is the biggest city in Tennessee by a comfortable margin.
孟菲斯位于田纳西州西南角，坐落在密西西比河东岸的高地上，是谢尔比县的县治所在。市区人口约 63 万，都会区人口超过 130 万。它是整条密西西比河沿岸最大的城市之一，也是田纳西州当之无愧的第一大城市。
For a visitor or a student of urban geography, the city is easiest to remember through a handful of labels: music, river, freight and civil rights. Each of them explains a different layer of the same place.
对旅行者或学习城市地理的同学来说，记住孟菲斯最简单的方法就是抓住几个关键词：音乐、河流、货运与民权。每一个词都解释着同一座城市的不同层面。
| Item / 项目 | Detail / 内容 |
| State / 所属州 | Tennessee, USA / 美国田纳西州 |
| River / 河流 | Mississippi River / 密西西比河 |
| Nicknames / 别称 | Home of the Blues; Birthplace of Rock and Roll / 蓝调之都；摇滚乐发源地 |
| Key labels / 代表厂牌 | Sun Records; Stax Records / 太阳唱片；斯塔克斯唱片 |
| Landmarks / 地标 | Beale Street; Graceland; FedExForum / 贝尔街；雅园；联邦快递球馆 |
2. Geography and the Mississippi River | 地理与密西西比河
The Mississippi is the defining physical feature of Memphis. The city was laid out on a high bluff, roughly 10 to 15 metres above the water, which kept the early settlement safe from most seasonal floods while still giving it direct access to river transport. The river itself runs about 3,766 km from Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico and drains a basin that covers more than 40% of the continental United States.
密西西比河是孟菲斯最根本的地理特征。城市建在高于水面约 10 至 15 米的高地上，这既让早期聚落免受多数季节性洪水的侵袭，又让它直接享有水运之利。密西西比河从明尼苏达州一路流向墨西哥湾，全长约 3,766 公里，其流域覆盖了美国本土 40% 以上的面积。
That position made Memphis a natural trans-shipment point: goods arriving by boat could be loaded onto wagons, railways and, later, trucks. Rivers, railways and roads all meet here, which is exactly why the modern logistics industry grew up in this city rather than somewhere else.
这一位置使孟菲斯天然成为转运枢纽：经水路运来的货物可以转装到马车、铁路，后来是卡车上。河流、铁路与公路在此交汇，这正是现代物流业在这座城市而非别处兴起的根本原因。
3. From Cotton Port to Modern City | 从棉花港到现代都市
Memphis was founded in 1819 and named after the ancient Egyptian city of Memphis on the Nile, a deliberate reference to a great river civilisation. In the nineteenth century it became one of the largest inland cotton markets in the world, with steamboats, warehouses, slave markets and railroads all tied to the cotton economy.
孟菲斯建城于 1819 年，取名自尼罗河畔的埃及古城孟菲斯，这一命名本身就是对伟大河流文明的致意。十九世纪，它成为世界上最大的内陆棉花市场之一，蒸汽船、仓库、奴隶市场与铁路都与棉花经济紧密相连。
The twentieth century brought both musical glory and painful history. In 1968 the city's sanitation workers went on strike for fair pay and dignity, and Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel while supporting them. That motel is now the site of the National Civil Rights Museum, one of the most visited historical sites in the American South.
二十世纪给这座城市带来了音乐的辉煌，也带来了沉痛的历史。1968 年，孟菲斯的环卫工人为争取公平待遇与尊严举行罢工，马丁·路德·金在支持罢工期间于洛林汽车旅馆遇刺。如今那家汽车旅馆已成为国家民权博物馆的所在地，也是美国南部参观人数最多的历史遗址之一。
4. Beale Street and the Birth of the Blues | 贝尔街与蓝调的诞生
The blues grew out of African American communities in the Mississippi Delta, drawing on work songs, field hollers, spirituals and the call-and-response tradition. As Black migrants moved into Memphis in the early twentieth century, the music moved with them, and Beale Street gradually became its commercial and creative core.
蓝调音乐从密西西比三角洲的非裔美国人社区中生长出来，吸收了劳动号子、田间呼喊、灵歌以及一唱一和的呼应传统。二十世纪初，随着黑人移民涌入孟菲斯，音乐也随之而来，贝尔街逐渐成为蓝调的商业与创作核心。
Musicians and music lovers crowded into the street's clubs, barber shops and storefronts, where performances and informal jam sessions went on constantly. W. C. Handy, often called the "Father of the Blues", published "Beale Street Blues" in 1916 and helped turn a local folk style into a written, publishable form. In 1977 Beale Street was designated a National Historic Landmark.
音乐家与乐迷挤满街上的俱乐部、理发店和临街铺面，演出与即兴合奏几乎从未间断。被誉为 "蓝调之父" 的 W. C. 汉迪于 1916 年出版了《贝尔街蓝调》，把一种地方性的民间风格变成了可记录、可出版的形式。1977 年，贝尔街被列为美国国家历史地标。
5. Blues Legends: Robert Johnson and Muddy Waters | 蓝调传奇：罗伯特·约翰逊与马迪·沃特斯
Legendary blues musicians such as Robert Johnson and Muddy Waters left unique musical marks on Memphis and its surrounding Delta region. Johnson recorded only a small number of sides in 1936 and 1937, yet songs like "Cross Road Blues" shaped the imagination of every guitarist who followed, and the crossroads legend is still told in the Delta today.
传奇布鲁斯音乐人罗伯特·约翰逊、马迪·沃特斯等，都曾在孟菲斯及其所在的三角洲地区留下独一无二的音乐印记。约翰逊仅在 1936 与 1937 年录制了数量有限的唱片，但《十字路口蓝调》这样的作品影响了此后每一位吉他手，而 "十字路口" 的传说至今仍在三角洲流传。
Muddy Waters, born in Rolling Fork, Mississippi, worked and recorded in the Delta before moving to Chicago in 1943, where he effectively electrified the blues and helped create the sound that British bands would later rediscover. Other names tied to the region include B. B. King, Howlin' Wolf and Memphis Minnie.
马迪·沃特斯出生于密西西比州罗灵福克，在迁往芝加哥之前一直在三角洲工作与录音，1943 年北上后他把蓝调 "电气化"，塑造出后来被英国乐队重新发现的声音。与这一地区相关的名字还包括 B. B. 金、嚎叫之狼与孟菲斯明妮。
- Robert Johnson - the Delta's most mythologised guitarist. / 罗伯特·约翰逊——三角洲最具传奇色彩的吉他手。
- Muddy Waters - a bridge from acoustic Delta blues to electric Chicago blues. / 马迪·沃特斯——从原声三角洲蓝调通向电子芝加哥蓝调的桥梁。
- B. B. King - known as the "Beale Street Blues Boy" early in his career. / B. B. 金——早年在贝尔街被称为 "贝尔街蓝调男孩"。
6. Sun Records and the Rock and Roll Revolution | 太阳唱片与摇滚乐革命
Memphis is equally important as a birthplace of rock and roll. In 1950 Sam Phillips opened the Memphis Recording Service, and in 1952 he launched Sun Records at 706 Union Avenue. The studio famously recorded anyone who walked in, and it is widely credited with capturing what many historians call the first rock and roll record, "Rocket 88" by Jackie Brenston and His Delta Cats in 1951.
孟菲斯同样是摇滚乐的重要发源地。1950 年，山姆·菲利普斯开办了孟菲斯录音服务社，1952 年又在联合大道 706 号创办太阳唱片。这家录音室以 "来者不拒" 地录制所有登门者而闻名，1951 年为杰基·布伦斯顿与他的三角洲猫乐队录制的《火箭 88》，被许多史学家视为第一张摇滚乐唱片。
In the 1950s Sun Records signed a group of artists who would change popular music completely: Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis and Roy Orbison. On 4 December 1956, Presley, Perkins, Lewis and Cash happened to be in the studio at the same time; the informal session was photographed and later labelled the "Million Dollar Quartet".
五十年代，太阳唱片签下了一批将彻底改变流行音乐版图的歌手：埃尔维斯·普雷斯利、乔尼·凯什、卡尔·帕金斯、杰里·李·刘易斯与罗伊·奥比森。1956 年 12 月 4 日，普雷斯利、帕金斯、刘易斯与凯什恰好同时出现在录音室，这场即兴合奏被拍下照片，后来被称为 "百万美元四重奏"。
The work of these artists triggered a genuine musical revolution, and it secured Memphis a permanent place in the history of rock and roll.
他们的作品引发了一场真正的音乐革命，也让孟菲斯在摇滚乐史上牢牢占据了一席之地。
7. Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash | 埃尔维斯·普雷斯利与乔尼·凯什
Elvis Presley was born in Tupelo, Mississippi, in 1935 and moved to Memphis as a teenager. In 1954 he recorded "That's All Right" at Sun Studio, and within a year he had signed with RCA and become a national phenomenon. Graceland, the mansion he bought in 1957, is now the second most visited private home in the United States and was opened to the public in 1982.
埃尔维斯·普雷斯利 1935 年出生于密西西比州图珀洛，少年时代迁居孟菲斯。1954 年他在太阳录音室录制了《没关系》，一年之内便签约 RCA 并成为全国性现象。他 1957 年购入的豪宅 "雅园" 如今是美国参观人数第二多的私人宅邸，自 1982 年起向公众开放。
Johnny Cash arrived in Memphis in the mid-1950s and recorded "Hey Porter" and "Cry! Cry! Cry!" for Sun Records in 1955. Songs such as "Folsom Prison Blues" and "I Walk the Line" made him one of the most recognisable voices in American music, and his later nickname, the "Man in Black", became a statement of solidarity as much as a style.
乔尼·凯什于五十年代中期来到孟菲斯，1955 年为太阳唱片录制了《嘿，搬运工》与《哭吧！哭吧！》。此后的《福尔瑟姆监狱蓝调》和《我走我的路》让他成为美国音乐中最具辨识度的嗓音之一，而他后来的绰号 "黑衣人"，既是风格，也是一种立场的宣示。
8. Stax Records, Soul and the Civil Rights Era | 斯塔克斯唱片、灵魂乐与民权时代
Sun Records was not the only influential label in town. Stax Records, founded in 1957 by Jim Stewart and Estelle Axton on McLemore Avenue, became the home of Southern soul. Its house band, Booker T. and the M.G.'s, backed artists such as Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes, Sam and Dave and Carla Thomas.
太阳唱片并非城中唯一有影响力的厂牌。1957 年由吉姆·斯图尔特与埃斯特尔·阿克斯顿在麦克勒莫尔大道创办的斯塔克斯唱片，成为南方灵魂乐的根据地。其驻场乐队布克·T 与 M.G.'s 为奥蒂斯·雷丁、艾萨克·海耶斯、山姆与戴夫、卡拉·托马斯等歌手伴奏。
What made Stax remarkable was that Black and white musicians wrote, recorded and performed together in a city that was still deeply segregated. That collaboration gave the label's sound a warmth and tension that is still studied today, and the 1972 Wattstax concert in Los Angeles became a landmark Black cultural event.
斯塔克斯之所以引人注目，是因为在一个种族隔离依然严重的城市里，黑人与白人
更多咨询请联系16621398022（同微信）
或截图后用「扫一扫 → 相册」选择本图