There is a new music festival coming to Memphis, Tennessee on October 6th & 7th at Shelby Farms Park, to celebrate the birthplace of Blues, Soul, and Rock & Roll. The inaugural MEMPHO Music Festival will open its doors with performances from Cage the Elephant, Cold War Kids, Bishop Briggs, Southern Avenue, and Dan Luke & the Raid on Friday night. The celebration will continue on Saturday with a full day of music from Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit, Anderson .Paak & The Free Nationals, a very special tribute to the music of Memphis set from Steve Cropper & Friends, Booker T. Presents: A Stax Revue and a Journey through Soul, Blues, and R&B, Robert Randolph & The Family Band, Hard Working Americans, The Weeks, and Jojo Hermann’s Slim Wednesday.
The festival has confirmed performers for its AutoZone Stage, which spotlights top acts from Memphis and surrounding region, and added new performers to its Main Stage. Reverend John Wilkins, a singer and guitarist in the tradition of Hill Country gospel and country-blues greats like Mississippi Fred McDowell and R.L. Burnside, will headline the Friday, October 6 AutoZone Stage schedule, alongside Dan Luke & The Raid, Bluff City favorites Star & Micey, and Dead Soldiers.
On Saturday, the jazz and blues sound of JoJo’s Slim Wednesday, led by Widespread Panic keyboardist John “JoJo” Hermann, culminates a day that features Marcella & Her Lovers, Devil Train, Objekt 12, Chinese Connection Dub Embassy, UTR, and local students from School of Rock. In addition, Memphis’ Stax Music Academy Band will open the festival’s Main Stage on Friday. Stax Music Academy is an after-school instructional program for aspiring musicians that focuses on the rich legacy and tradition of Stax Records, once located on the same spot where the Academy now sits.
Big River Presents have recruited a stellar team of professionals to work with the event, including production manager and fellow Memphian Mike Smith from Widespread Panic, Royal Studios owner Lawrence “Boo” Mitchell, former Ardent/Compass Point Studios engineer and legendary producer Terry Manning, Rolling Stones and Allman Brothers Band keyboardist Chuck Leavell, and the city of Memphis.
Chuck Leavell, who is also the founder of the Mother Nature Network (MNN) added in a recent press release, “As a special advisor to MEMPHO, I’m proud to help bring one of the greatest musical cities in the world a new kind of music festival. The setting is spectacular and the talent line-up is top notch with a combination of great new artists and some established fan favorites. As an environmentalist, I’m also very pleased that everyone involved has a high sensitivity to keeping the event clean and green, and in harmony with nature.”
With the tagline, “music food and nature,” MEMPHO seems to share the urge to preserve the rich musical history of Memphis. Its founders are committed to making it an integral part of the Memphis cultural scene for years to come. At 4,500 acres, Memphis’s Shelby Farms Park feels like the obvious home for this new-natured event. The Park features miles of paved and unpaved trails, dozens of lakes and ponds, the internationally recognized and sustainably designed Woodland Discovery Playground, a buffalo herd, the FedEx Event Center, The Kitchen Bistro and Kitchenette, a water play splash pad, an outdoor event stage overlooking an 80-acre lake, a treetop adventure course and more. It’s the perfect backdrop for this exciting inaugural event. Tickets — including single-day and two-day general admission and VIP passes — are on sale here. Ticket prices, which currently begin at $40, will increase Friday, Sept. 8.
For more information, head to the festival’s website.
