Thacker Mountain Radio and the National Folk Festival Announce Second Annual Collaboration
Companies will help bring three days of free music and dance from across America to Downtown Jackson, Mississippi
Jackson, MS, September 17, 2026 — Thacker Mountain Radio Hour, the music and literature show based in Oxford, MS, is bringing its award-winning program to the 83rd National Folk Festival in Jackson, MS. The show will help kick off the three-day festival weekend with its performance on Thursday, November 12 at 7 pm at Hal and Mal’s in Downtown Jackson. This special collaboration is sponsored by Visit Jackson and Visit Oxford.
Guests will include Mississippi author, Jasmine Holmes, as well as National Folk Festival artists Rebolú, a dynamic Afro-Colombian ensemble, and Dat Mighty 9, bringing their high-octane Mardi Gras Indian sound.
Doors open at 6pm. Admission is $15 in advance, and $20 at the door. Tickets are available online (https://www.halandmals.com/) or at Hal and Mal’s, located at 200 Commerce Street, Jackson, MS 39201. Phone (601) 948-0888.
The show is hosted by Jim Dees with house band, Paul Tate and the Yalobushwhackers. The Jackson performance will not be broadcast live, but will air the following week, November 18-22.
The Thacker Mountain Radio Hour, now in its 29th year, is heard every Saturday at 5 pm and Sunday at 6 pm on Mississippi Public Broadcasting (https://www.mpbonline.org/).
Other affiliates, airtimes and archives information is available at the show’s website: https://thackermountain.com/.
Jasmine Holmes is an educator, historian, and author whose work moves between the classroom and the archive. She has written several trade-published nonfiction books, and her debut novel, Our Sister's Keeper, marks her entrance into fiction. A Southern gothic horror set in a fictional all-Black town in 1927 Mississippi, it follows women who carry the weight of memory, sisterhood, and inherited trauma across generations.
Rebolú, from New York City and Tampa, is the foremost Afro-Colombian ensemble in the United States, playing the rich, rhythmic, and undeniably danceable music of Colombia’s Caribbean coast. Weaving indigenous and contemporary instruments into a vibrant expression of Afro-Colombian culture, Rebolú remains true to its cultural roots while simultaneously forging new paths.
The visual splendor and high-energy sound of Black Masking Carnival culture meets Mardi Gras Indian funk instrumentation as Dat Mighty 9 propels a deep New Orleans tradition into thrilling new territory.
First held in 1934, the National Folk Festival is holding its second year of a three-year residency in Downtown Jackson this fall. The 83rd National Folk Festival runs from November 13-15 and features over 300 of the nation’s finest traditional performers across the three days, with continuous performances on up to six outdoor stages, from State Street to Lamar Street and from Pascagoula Street to Yazoo Street, all free.
Festivalgoers will enjoy nonstop music and dance, parades, hands-on craft demonstrations, family-friendly fun, a bustling festival marketplace, and a mouthwatering array of regional and international cuisine.
The 83rd National Folk Festival will prominently feature National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship recipients, our nation’s highest honor for the traditional arts, in a special program celebrating America’s 250th anniversary. The festival is also participating this year in Of the People: The Smithsonian Festival of Festivals, a series of programs and exchanges marking the U.S. Semiquincentennial and showcasing the country’s remarkable cultural landscape. Additionally it received funding from the Smithsonian’s “Our Shared Future: 250,” a Smithsonian-wide initiative supported by private philanthropy and created to commemorate the nation’s 250th anniversary and advance the Smithsonian vision for the next 250 years.
The National Folk Festival is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
For more information on the National Folk Festival visit: https://www.nationalfolkfestival.com/.
