BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN
In the '60s, long before he was anyone's Boss, the high schooler played this guitar with the Castiles, a band that lit up the clubs and bars of the Jersey Shore.

Photography by BRIAN LANKER

el-lo, Cleveland! In the city that gave rock and roll its premier deejay, Alan Freed--who in turn gave the sound its name--a new museum opens its doors on Labor Day weekend, 1995. The project was born in 1986 when the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation inducted its first batch of rock legends. But inducted them into what? There was no building. Cleveland, eager to prove itself more than a punch line, bid for the museum, and in 1993 ground was broken for a 150,000-square-foot structure designed by I.M. Pei, architect of such celebrated projects as the National Gallery's East Wing and the Louvre's glass pyramid. "It was my intention to echo the energy of rock and roll," says Pei. As unique as the music itself, the museum is a $100 million marvel of geometric forms and cantilevered spaces, anchored by a 162-foot tower. Inside, the Hall boasts the latest in interactive exhibits, performance spaces for the real deal and, of course, a record store. Confirming that rock has always been about style as well as sound, there are hundreds of flashy displays: instruments, posters and clothes, clothes, clothes--(see Clothesline of the gods below)--all hard by the shores of Lake Erie, where, a few generations after its raucous birth, the sound of rebellious youth has grown up, settled down, found a home.

JERRY LEE LEWIS
From the '50s heyday of Sun Records, the Hall has rare discs made by Elvis, Johnny Cash and Roy Orbison as well as the Killer.

SUN RECORDS LEDGER
A handwritten logbook notes the brief span of recording sessions that launched the Presley legend.

OTIS REDDING
On December 10, 1967, the soul singer was killed when his plane crashed into a Wisconsin lake. A local family salvaged this piece of fuselage.