Backers of the proposed Museum of African American Music Art & Culture at the north end of Bicentennial Mall have refocused their efforts to focus only on the music element. Joey Garrison reports the $47.5 million project is still scheduled to open in late 2013 and has brought on board some heavy-hitter board members, including AT&T Tennessee President Gregg Morton and Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis partner Waverly Crenshaw.

Pictured here is an updated concept for the building. Here's the new website and a previous rendering from a different angle.

Local apartment investment firm Carter-Haston has paid more than than $45 million to buy a three-year-old complex in Germantown outside Memphis. The Preserve at Forest Creek has more than 400 units in various sizes. Carter-Haston was launched almost 25 years ago, runs dozens of apartment complexes and has offices in four other Southeastern states.

SEE ALSO: Masters of the Game from Nashville Post magazine way back in 2002

In today's City Paper, William Williams points out that last decade's condo boom is giving way to a deliberate increase in apartment construction, especially near Nashville's core. More than 1,100 rental units are due to come online in the next few years. If they are as successful as Bristol Development's 1700 Midtown project has been, that will mean very good things for the city as a work/live/play hub.

The politics and the money still need to be sorted out, but plenty of folks have been thinking for a good while about the future home of the Nashville Sounds. The Civic Design Center on Tuesday hosted a forum showcasing the work of University of Tennessee College of Architecture + Design graduate students who have been musing since the fall on how to integrate a potential Sounds stadium into Sulphur Dell or the North Gulch areas. The students also were asked to think of how multiple uses could in turn be built into the venue.

We hope to have more images from the event soon, but in the meantime, here's a taste of some of the designs Sushant Verma came up with. Want to go check out the designs in person? The Civic Design Center is displaying them all month.