Tulsa, Oklahoma

This Town Was Made for Music Lovers

Executive summary by darmansjah

An interactive map at downtown Tulsa’s Woody Guthrice Center

TULSA, OKLAHOMA An alternative steak fuels this oil town. A mural on downtown’s new Woody Guthrie Center shows the Oklahoman songwriter holding a guitar tagged “This machine kills fascist”-words he scrawled on his instrument in 1943 but not the one his name usually conjures. “This Land is Your Land isn’t just aqq campfire song; Guthrie really was a radical,” says Dena McCloud, executive director of the museum. Tulsa likewise is often misunderstood. With an art deco skyline of gargoyles and spires, the icty has long been rich in the arts, from Cain’s Ballroom-displaying paraphernalia from famous headliners including Bob Wils, the Sex Pistols, and Wilco-to a glassblowing school and the 19,000-seat BOK Center. Additions such as the Woody Guthrie Center and a downtown branch of the Philbrook contemporary art museum have reinvigorated the historic Brady Arts District. The 19-story Mayo Hotel, a 1925 landmark with Doric columns, seemed fasted for demolition a few years ago; now renovated, it attracts post-arena-concert crowds to its rooftop bar (part of suite where Elvis Presley once stayed). And on any given night at SoundPony, whether punk or electronic, the music is always free and original. “We were weird before Austin,” says sculptor Colleen Stiles. “We just kept it to ourselves.”