
ASHLEY L. EVANS
Like much of Nashville, the midtown neighborhood encompassing 16th and 17th Ave. S. known as Music Row has undergone dramatic changes.
While it is still home to record labels, publishing houses, and recording studios, several large residential apartment complexes have emerged in the area. With the demographics of that community shifting — and prime real estate at the corner of 17th and Grand available for purchase — Huseyin and Harun Ustankaya saw an opportunity to introduce a new restaurant. This fall, they opened Music Row Bar and Grill, transforming a one-story modernist office building into a chic, comfortable eatery, complete with a central bar, main and private dining rooms, and a large, appealing outdoor terrace. The restaurant’s simple name belies its offerings. Music Row Bar and Grill serves an array of dishes influenced, in large part, by the cuisines of the Mediterranean Rim.
The Ustankaya brothers each have three decades of experience in hospitality, beginning in their homeland, Turkey. They arrived in the United States in the late 90s, working at Nashville Airport Marriott and later at Gaylord before embarking on their own. In 2003, they opened the popular Turkish restaurant, Anatolia, in Lion’s Head Village where it is still flourishing today, followed in 2014 by Chateau West, a French brasserie on West End. For this new concept, they wanted to create a neighborhood gathering place on the row that reflected more of the eclectic tastes of our time.
“There are many restaurants and bars in Nashville serving American and Southern foods,” says Huseyin. “We wanted to showcase a wide variety of globally inspired flavors while sustainably sourcing local and regional ingredients.”
Indeed, the menu reads like a map of the Silk Road, with Mezze — shareable small plates — to include Afghani kofta with spicy red sauce and garlic aioli, Turkish whipped feta and hummus with toasted pita, Italian calamari sautéed in red pepper purée, and Spanish papas bravas striped in romesco. You can pop in for a glass of Malbec and a nosh of Medjool dates filled with herbed chèvre or settle in for a dinner of roasted chicken Marsala over mushroom risotto.
If you have dietary restrictions, you can easily navigate selections by requesting their gluten free and dairy free menus. Fish and seafood dishes are executed with finesse. Camarones, large shrimp, are plump and sweet in a butter-drenched garlic confit. Properly seared sea scallops, perched on pasta discs, get an extra punch of flavor from a base of spinach-charred jalapeño crema. A thick slab of marinated grilled salmon has the right balance of textures — the fork-tender fillet has a crispy exterior that flakes off into medium-rare planks, with a topping of salsa verde gilding the dish.
Other fruits of the sea beckon: a bowl of steamed mussels and clams in tamarind-sage butter, with toasted points to sop up the savory-sweet broth and pan-roasted halibut over blistered cherry tomato couscous. If it’s meat you’re wanting, look no further than the grilled skirt steak in beet chimichurri mezze or the main of lamb chops and mint quinoa. Order a salad of mixed greens, figs, crumbled goat cheese, and toasted almonds lightly dressed in honey vinaigrette for starters. And round out your meal with pistachio-walnut baklava for dessert.
Music Row Bar and Grill is open every day beginning at 11 a.m., serving lunch and dinner. Happy hour specials are offered daily, from 3 to 6 p.m. Huseyin and Harun Ustankaya are well versed in the art of hospitality — a Turkish sensibility ingrained in their nature, and they are ever pleased to share that warmth. As Huseyin notes, “In Turkey, we take pride in bringing out the best for our guests.”
(1000 17th Ave. S., 629-702-2424; musicrowbargrill.com)