This Year's Event:

Joey Lauren Adams (host)

As an actress in both studio and independent films, Adams has enjoyed a long string of commercial and critical successes. Her most acclaimed performance in the hit film Chasing Amy earned a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress. Originally hailing from North Little Rock, Arkansas, Adams began acting early in life, performing at local church productions. Arriving in Los Angeles as a teenager, she soon received her first big break with roles on television shows such as "Married With Children" and "Top Of The Heap." She moved into feature films such as Dazed And Confused, Coneheads, S.F.W., Michael, Bio-Dome, Mallrats, Big Daddy, Bruno, Harvard Man and The Break Up.

Cassandra Wilson

Cassandra Wilson, named America's Best Jazz Singer by Time Magazine, is one of the most successful jazz vocalists of the modern era. The Jackson native attended Millsaps College and Jackson Statue University earned a degree in marketing while pursuing her musical career. Equally at home with blues repertoire as she is with the avant-garde, she's been named both Downbeat's Female Jazz Vocalist of the Year and its Best Jazz Singer. She's the winner of two GRAMMY Awards^® (Best Jazz Vocal Performance and Best Jazz Vocal Album) and her life and music are noted by a Mississippi Blues Trail marker on Albermarie Road in Jackson where she grew up.

The Williams Brothers

The Williams Brothers today are comprised of Melvin Williams, Doug Williams and Henry Green and date back to 1960, just two years after GRAMMY Award's inception, when Leon "Pop" Williams founded the group. They began recording in 1973 on their own Blackberry Records, the first black-owned and -operated record label in Mississippi, and have received five GRAMMY nominations as they continue to dominate the soul/gospel genre with three No. 1 Billboard singles and sixteen top ten albums. With their constant output of new recordings and original compositions, The Williams Brothers are widely considered the most prolific quartet within the entire gospel genre.

The Mississippi Mass Choir

The Mississippi Mass Choir, the Jackson-based gospel group of monumental stature will support the Williams Brothers in Biloxi. From their earliest recordings more than 20 years ago, the choir has been a chart phenomenon with such recordings as Live, God Gets The Glory and It Remains To Be Seen all hitting No.1 on Billboard's Gospel Chart.

Beatrice

A well-known artist on the Scandinavian music scene, Beatrice performs a unique blend of folk, rock, country and Scandinavian influences. Beatrice began singing when she was a young girl, when her mother would play the piano and she would sing along. Her passion for country music was born after she was given the opportunity to sing the Dolly Parton song "High and Mighty." Through the years, Beatrice has been singing and dancing in variety shows, such as "Christmas At Hilton," "The Blue Moon Bar Show," "The Wild West Show" and countless others.

Blues Jam Session with Eddie Cotton

Eddie Cotton was born the son of a preacher in Jackson, Mississippi, and began playing guitar at the age of four. He attended Jackson State University where he majored in music and began playing professionally at local clubs. In 1995, he left college to pursue his musical ambitions, which led to the creation of a band called The Mississippi Cotton Club. Cotton's impassioned, soulful vocals and fluid, biting guitar combined with his powerful stage presence left no doubt that a new king was claiming his throne as one of the best guitar players to rise from the Mississippi Delta in many years.

Hubert Sumlin

Hubert Sumlin was born in Greenwood and went on to work with many Mississippi-born Chicago blues greats including Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf and was recently a GRAMMY nominee.

Bobby Rush

Bobby Rush was inducted into the Blues Foundation's Blues Hall of Fame and was featured in the Martin Scorsese-directed "Blues" series on PBS. A tireless promoter of the blues, he will represent the United States this September at the Shanghai World Expo and was honored earlier this year with a citation issued by both the House and Senate of the State of Tennessee for his role as a "living example of black history, as an artist, as a man, as a mentor and as a champion of the people." He was also honored by the posting of a Blues Trail Marker in Jackson.

Zac Harmon

Zac Harmon, born and raised in Jackson and a notable product of the capitol city's Farish Street is also a featured Bluesapalooza player. He is a past winner of the Blues Foundation's International Blues Challenge and, more recently, was voted Best New Blues Artist by XM Radio listeners. Harmon produced several tracks for Black Uhuru's GRAMMY-nominated Mystical Truth album.

Tribute to Jim Henson and the Muppets under the direction of Benjamin Wright

Benjamin Wright's tribute to the late Jim Henson celebrates the musical legacy of the late Muppets creator whose "Sesame Street" characters include Big Bird, Oscar The Grouch, and Cookie Monster. These and other reflections of Henson's mirthful and fertile imagination including Miss Piggy have captivated and enlightened five generations of children with music and song always playing a big role in the process. Henson was born in Greenville though Leland is the home of the Jim Henson Museum Exhibition and is known as "The Birthplace of Kermit The Frog."

Mac McAnally

If Mac McAnally never sang or played another note of music, his place in music history is more than assured. And yet an almost inevitable momentum seems to be taking his career and carrying it to places it has never been. The fact that two of country music's biggest stars have given McAnally an almost reverential nod speaks to just how much energy the celebrated songwriter, guitarist, vocalist and producer is developing as a recording artist.

In 2007, McAnally was inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. The following year, the Mississippi Musicians Hall of Fame followed suit, while the Country Music Association named him Musician of the Year. And, Mac continues to own and operate his own recording studio in Muscle Shoals.

King Edward

Edward Antoine, King Edward, was born in Rayne, Louisiana into a family of 12 talented brothers and sisters. Coming from a musical family, he taught himself to play the guitar and earned the name "Blues Picking King".
King Edward lived in Chicago for 15 years where he performed at the Regal Theater and toured with his brother Nolan Struck and the great McKinley Mitchell.

King later moved to Jackson, Miss. where he recorded his first album, Genuine Mississippi Blues with ACE Record Company. He was a regular guitarist at the famous Subway Club in Jackson, MS and was featured in "The Last of the Mississippi Jukes." 
King has played with legends such as Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Buddy Guy, Junior Wells, James Cotton, Sam Myers, and even opened for B.B. King.

King has been honored in word on three blues markers in Jackson, MS on the State of Mississippi Blues Trail; The Subway marker, The Queen of Hearts marker and most recently on The Ace Records marker. He performed at the Chicago Blues Festival in June, 2009.