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Jubilee Jam
Smaller is better? Well, you probably wouldn’t get a Sweet Potato Queen to say that, but it was true of Jubilee!Jam last year, which reined in the pylons by a few blocks and ended up with a spot-on outdoor festival, complete with a lack of show-stopping rain. Sure, it was a little hot, but we’re supposed to be hip to that. The acts were good, the turnout was nice, and everybody got their famous Thing-You-Shouldn’t-Eat-Even-Once-a-Year on a Stick. That’s the point.
--Todd Stauffer (Best of Jackson, Best Festival 2005)
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It was raining at the first Jubilee Jam I ever went to—as it always is, by virtue of city ordinance. The Box Tops were clanking through “Neon Rainbow.” “Wow. This isn’t very good, is it?” I asked the gentleman next to me, easily 25 years my senior. “No, it’s not,” he said. “But they played my high school when I was 17, and I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”
Jubilee! JAM brings that to Jackson: the music that you’ve loved since high school, live and in the rain. In the past few years the world-class artists who have graced our city’s stage has been staggering, a roster that rarely visits cities three times our size: Bob Dylan, Joan Jett, the Temptations, Al Green, Willie Nelson, Emmylou Harris and every band that ever played the clubs you got drunk and made out in while you lived in Starkville or Oxford or Hattiesburg.
Johnny Shines played it before he died, and so did Sun Ra, and even Aaliyah. Johnny and June played it together before we lost them last year.
Maybe the real reason I like Jubilee! JAM so much is because you get to stagger up and down East Capitol Street, six-dollar draft beer in your hand, lean up against the gates of the Governor’s Mansion, and it’s all perfectly legal. With those iron bars cold on my back, I feel a century’s worth of phantom governors, frowning down through the rain, as Isaac Hayes echoes through the streets of Jackson.
--Gorjus (Best of Jackson, Best Festival 2004)
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Since 1987, the third weekend in May in Jackson has meant one thing. Jubliee!Jam with its three days of music, arts, crafts and food has become of one Mississippi’s most anticipated events. Since its inception, diversity has been the key to its success, with musical talent from the full spectrum. James Brown, Little Richard, the Neville Brothers, Gregg Allman, Little Feat, The Temptations, Bonnie Raitt, John Prine, Blood Sweat and Tears, Sun Ra, Grand Funk Railroad, The Fabulous Thunderbirds, George Clinton, Johnny Cash and Smash Mouth have all played the main stage under the stars of downtown at One Jackson Place.
Jubliee!Jam compliments the eclectic musical talent with family activities, entertainment, food, arts, and craft vendors who come free of charge each year to sell their wares and an Artist Showcase limited to members of the Craftsmen’s Guild of Mississippi. Jubliee!Jam and its five musical stages are sponsored by local businesses and requires over 1,000 volunteers each year to help make it a success. If you don’t volunteer, be sure to show your support and thank those who do. Keep checking www.jubileejam.com and www.jacksonfreepress.com in the coming months for this year’s lineup announcement.
--Herman Snell (Best of Jackson, Best Festival 2003)
