{"id":7494,"date":"2026-01-07T16:09:33","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T21:09:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/?p=7494"},"modified":"2026-01-19T12:46:57","modified_gmt":"2026-01-19T17:46:57","slug":"walking-in-memphis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/?p=7494","title":{"rendered":"Walking in Memphis &#8211; with Video"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Last year, I was able to visit Memphis with my wife and doggy and we had the pleasure of walking down Beale Street and seeing Elvis&#8217; mansion.  This song means more to me now.  And by the way, there is really a Muriel who played at the Hollywood.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"720\" height=\"405\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/6AJ4lwypi4I?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-audio\"><audio controls src=\"https:\/\/www.baselines.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/all-songs\/mp3\/Walking_In_Memphis_2026.mp3\"><\/audio><\/figure>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"203\" height=\"249\" src=\"https:\/\/baselines.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/muriel-203x249.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-7495\" style=\"width:722px;height:auto\"\/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<h1 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How I wrote \u2018Walking In Memphis\u2019 by Marc Cohn<\/h1>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/author\/duncan-haskell\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Duncan Haskell<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;on 8 November 2022 at 9:45 pm<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-1.jpg.webp\" alt=\"Walking In Memphis songwriter Marc Cohn\" width=\"1000\" height=\"710\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-1.jpg.webp 1000w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-1-600x426.jpg.webp 600w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-1-800x568.jpg.webp 800w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-1-768x545.jpg.webp 768w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-1-335x238.jpg.webp 335w\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-53136\">Marc Cohn on&nbsp;<em>Walking In Memphis<\/em>: \u201cThere was no sense until the very end of the trip that there might be a song in there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">A romantic trip to Memphis, Tennessee led to a special friendship being formed and a classic hit single being born<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Even if its contribution ended with the songs created at the legendary Sun Studio, Memphis\u2019s place in the annals of music would be assured, but there\u2019s so much more. Nestled on the banks of the Mississippi River, the \u201cHome of the Blues and Birthplace of Rock \u2018n\u2019 Roll\u201d had a similar impact on the development of soul, gospel, jazz and R&amp;B. Rufus Wainwright, The Pixies, Chuck Berry and Bob Dylan are just a small selection of musicians who have been inspired to name songs after Tennessee\u2019s second largest city. Perhaps most famous of all is Marc Cohn\u2019s&nbsp;<em>Walking In Memphis<\/em>, memorably covered by Cher in 1995.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Written by a young songwriter who was still trying to find his voice, it blends the factual with the personal, the spiritual with the mystical \u2013 perhaps why the songwriter eventually asks himself, \u201cBut do I really feel the way I feel?\u201d The success of the song and Cohn\u2019s platinum-selling debut album was the launch pad for a career as a performer and songwriter still going strong to this day. Here, he tells us how a song about a very specific place has taken him across the globe\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/how-i-wrote\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">More \u2018How I wrote\u2019 features<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><em>Related<\/em>&nbsp;Articles<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/interviews\/interview-ashley-monroe\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Interview: Ashley MonroeAs a songwriter, solo artist and member of country supergroup Pistol Annies&#8230;Read More<em>+<\/em><\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/interviews\/song-by-song-the-sun-and-the-blues-by-emma-king\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Song-by-Song: \u2018The Sun And The Blues\u2019 by Emma KingBritish songwriter Emma King takes us through her new mini-album which was &#8230;Read More<em>+<\/em><\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/interviews\/it-must-have-been-love-roxette\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">How I wrote \u2018It Must Have Been Love\u2019 by Roxette\u2019s Per GessleThe Swedish soft-rock duo\u2019s lead singer reveals the ballad that grace&#8230;Read More<em>+<\/em><\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/interviews\/interview-billie-ray-martin\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Interview: Billie Ray MartinShe\u2019s&nbsp;worked with a Who\u2019s Who of&nbsp;dance&#8230;Read More<em>+<\/em><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-walking-in-memphis.jpg.webp\" alt=\"Marc Cohn 'Walking In Memphis' cover\" width=\"200\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-walking-in-memphis.jpg.webp 200w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-walking-in-memphis-100x100.jpg.webp 100w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-walking-in-memphis-120x120.jpg.webp 120w\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-53138\"><strong>Released:<\/strong>&nbsp;7 March 1991<br><strong>Artist:<\/strong>&nbsp;Marc Cohn<br><strong>Label:<\/strong>&nbsp;Atlantic<br><strong>Songwriters:<\/strong>&nbsp;Marc Cohn<br><strong>Producers:<\/strong>&nbsp;Marc Cohn, Ben Wisch<br><strong>UK chart position:<\/strong>&nbsp;22<br><strong>US chart position:<\/strong>&nbsp;13<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWhere to begin? I was about 25 years old when I was summoned to Memphis by a woman I was dating. She later became my wife and even later became my ex-wife, so she did the whole full circle. She had a sense that I would love it in Memphis and that I should come down there. I don\u2019t even know if she was aware of how connected I was to the music that had been made there. From soul music to gospel music to every kind of music\u2026 so much of it has its roots there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cRight around the same time, I was reading a magazine interview with&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/steadyhq.com\/en\/songwriting\/posts\/5d5570bb-ab55-49a1-b97f-85fa260516a3\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">James Taylor<\/a>&nbsp;and they asked him if he had any advice for upcoming songwriters. His advice was to do what he called \u2018a geographic\u2019. He explained that meant to go somewhere with your guitar or keyboard that you\u2019ve never been before. Take a train or plane, take a bus, get in a car, just go somewhere where your sensibilities might be re-awakened because you\u2019re somewhere you\u2019ve never been. That dovetailed with my summoning so I decided to go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cLuckily, she had already befriended this lovely couple who really knew Memphis. Not just the places that everybody goes like Graceland, but Al Green\u2019s church and the Hollywood Caf\u00e9, where this wonderful woman named Muriel was singing. They\u2019re the ones that took me on this tour that largely became the song. I went there looking for inspiration, but at the same time, there had already been such a plethora of great songs about Memphis that I thought, \u2018I probably won\u2019t be able to write about Memphis,\u2019 even though I was there to sort of get the vibe, the ghosts, the stories, whatever it was. There was no sense until the very end of the trip that there might be a song in there, but it was still kind of a distant thought. While I was there, I was just soaking in what was happening. There was really no time to process it for writing. I had to absorb it first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe first centrepiece of the trip and of the song was visiting Al Green\u2019s church. One of my all-time heroes and there he is preaching the gospel for four hours. It was an August morning in Memphis and the sweat was rolling down my back. Reverend Al\u2019s voice kept getting stronger and stronger. He was in the spirit and, for a Jewish kid from Cleveland, I was about as in the spirit as I could possibly be. It was just a remarkable experience. Only topped really by meeting Muriel Davis Wilkins, who was singing in a catfish and fried-pickle eatery called the Hollywood Cafe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-embed-handler wp-block-embed-embed-handler wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"720\" height=\"405\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/PgRafRp-P-o?wmode=transparent&#038;version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cMuriel was up on stage and there was an instant connection the minute I saw and heard her. I had an immediate affinity for this woman I didn\u2019t know. She was about 65 years old at the time, a school teacher in Arkansas who was playing the Hollywood to make a little extra money on weekends for her family. During her first break, I went up and introduced myself and told her how much I loved her singing and her playing. She was such a soulful piano player, playing mostly gospel music and standards. She was very generous and interested in me and my story, as you imagine a school teacher might be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.songwriting.net\/xmas-sm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/xmasbanner5-2.jpg\" alt=\"Christmas Songwriting Competition 2025\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cShe asked me a lot about my past, I told her that I was a struggling songwriter, that I had come to Memphis looking for inspiration and that I hadn\u2019t written the songs I thought I was capable of writing yet. We talked about all this. She just took it all in, absorbing in her own way. At some point late at night, she invited me up on stage to sing. I was thrilled but I was terrified.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cMuriel did her set, which was a lot of gospel music that I didn\u2019t know. She would whisper in my ear, prompting me, and I would make up a melody, go with the rhythm of her piano playing and sing along. Then, at the very end of the night when it was quite late she did&nbsp;<em>Amazing Grace<\/em>, which I knew of course. We sang it together a cappella and the place turned so quiet. That was a moment I\u2019ll never forget.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cOne other thing we had talked about was the death of both of my parents when I was quite young. I lost my mother when I was two and I lost my dad when I was 12. At the end of singing&nbsp;<em>Amazing Grace<\/em>&nbsp;she just leaned over and whispered in my ear, \u2018Child, you can move on now. Your mom is with you.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt might have been a day or two after I got back to New York City, where I had just moved, that I started to play around with an idea about Memphis. The one thing I remember very clearly is that I started to write it on guitar. I had this arpeggiated figure in my mind. I tried to play it on guitar and it didn\u2019t sound right. I though to myself, \u2018This might be better on piano.\u2019 Once I made that switch from guitar to piano, the whole thing flowed pretty easily. I remember that it was a fairly easy song to write, and an impossibly hard song to record.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/steady.page\/songwriting\/?utm_source=songwriting&amp;utm_medium=text-link&amp;utm_campaign=ongoing-member-promo&amp;utm_content=mid-content-bar\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Get the magazine dedicated to songwriters and enjoy exclusive benefits<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-and-muriel-davis-wilkins.jpg.webp\" alt=\"Marc Cohn performing with Muriel Davis-Wilkins\" width=\"1000\" height=\"710\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-and-muriel-davis-wilkins.jpg.webp 1000w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-and-muriel-davis-wilkins-600x426.jpg.webp 600w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-and-muriel-davis-wilkins-800x568.jpg.webp 800w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-and-muriel-davis-wilkins-768x545.jpg.webp 768w, https:\/\/www.songwritingmagazine.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/marc-cohn-and-muriel-davis-wilkins-335x238.jpg.webp 335w\"><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-53137\">Marc Cohn performing to Muriel Davis Wilkins<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cAt that time, I really didn\u2019t have a band that played my music who I could suss out arrangements with. So when I sat down at a piano, I wasn\u2019t thinking about rhythm, or bass parts, or guitar parts or anything at all. Me and the piano, that\u2019s all I cared about. I knew that I had turned a corner as a songwriter when I wrote that song because it worked so well without any adornment. It begins with me alone. Slowly it builds, the rhythm comes and goes, and towards the end of the song there\u2019s no band again. We were trying to figure out how to make this an intimate performance even with a band. That took a while to find the right players, the right arrangement for all of that to coalesce and become what it eventually became. It took weeks and several versions until we found the arrangement we were looking for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s hard to know why a song resonates with a listener.&nbsp;<em>Walking In Memphis<\/em>&nbsp;is a narrative with a beginning, middle and end. I think some people were just drawn to the story, I think others liked the sound of a new voice they hadn\u2019t heard. From what I\u2019ve been told, it\u2019s that last verse that draws people in and makes them want to hear the song again. I knew when I wrote the line where Muriel asks if I\u2019m a Christian that I was beginning to write the kinds of songs that I had been hoping to write.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cTony Bennett said that&nbsp;<em>I Left My Heart In San Francisco<\/em>&nbsp;took him around the world, he said it was his, \u2018calling card\u2019. That\u2019s how I feel about&nbsp;<em>Walking In Memphis<\/em>; it literally did take me around the world several times. I\u2019m still very proud of the song. I rarely feel bored when I sing it. And believe me, I have to sing it every night on the road. I have other songs that I feel just as strongly about, if not stronger, but I\u2019m grateful for the fact that I have this song that really has taken me around the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cI forgot to say the most important thing\u2026&nbsp;<em>Memphis<\/em>&nbsp;was just the beginning. For the next eight months, I wrote what basically turned out to be my first record. Most of those songs were written right after leaving Memphis and meeting Muriel, who had given me her blessing to move on, which I did in a big way. I didn\u2019t know I was going to get signed or anything but I knew I had written songs that were at a different level than I had written before. When I had four or five new songs, I went back to Memphis to Hollywood to play the new songs for Muriel. She had her arms crossed and was listening very attentively to these four or five new songs. When I was all done playing, she said, \u2018Those are beautiful songs child. But you know that one where you mentioned me? Play that again. I think that\u2019s the best one.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h5 class=\"wp-block-heading\">For all Marc\u2019s latest tour and music news, head over to&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/marccohnmusic.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">marccohnmusic.com<\/a><\/h5>\n\n<script>\nvar zbPregResult = '0';\n<\/script>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last year, I was able to visit Memphis with my wife and doggy and we had the pleasure of walking down Beale Street and seeing Elvis&#8217; mansion. This song means more to me now. And by the way, there is really a Muriel who played at the Hollywood. How I wrote \u2018Walking In Memphis\u2019 by [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7494","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7494","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7494"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7494\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7505,"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7494\/revisions\/7505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7494"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7494"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baselines.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7494"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}