When Americanafest got going in the early 2000s, the entire business and artistic community could fit into a hotel ballroom, as we were recently reminded in Tamara Saviano’s new book. The growth of the fall gathering has been epic across almost 25 years, and this year looks like the biggest blowout yet. Attendees, professionals and fans alike, will have more choices than ever, and the Americana Music Association has confidence that there will be enough interest and warm bodies to fill up two of Nashville’s largest venues, a bunch of club-based showcases, and a dozen special events. And that’s just on Tuesday night.
TUESDAY
It’ll be a heck of a launch for the week ahead, with two officially endorsed, full-scale concerts happening downtown. Dwight Yoakam’s tour swings by the Ascend Amphitheater with Shooter Jennings and Ben Haggard on the bill. At the nearby Schermerhorn Symphony Center, Maggie Rose and the Secret Sisters will match their mighty voices with the Nashville Symphony for an exciting set of arrangements that nobody’s heard before. I’d love to attend that, but Amy Alvey and I will be hosting our fourth annual WMOT Old Fashioned String Band Throwdown at Dee’s Lounge in Madison. It’s one of almost a dozen officially sanctioned special events and parties, including the famous BMI Rooftop On The Row and a tribute show for the late Nanci Griffith with a stellar cast at the City Winery (7:30 pm)
I feel sympathy for artists who landed official showcases and then were programmed up against this maelstrom, because there are some notable and fascinating emerging talents among them. Fans of traditional blues and fingerstyle guitar have been gobsmacked for the past year or two by the skill and authentic devotion of Irish teenager Muireann Bradley (AB Hillsboro Village at 7 pm) For hard, rustic string band music with an insightful, young writer in the John Prine vein, see Colby T. Helms and the Virginia Creepers (City Winery Lounge at 8 pm). Jesse Welles, who has earned huge attention for his caustic and on-target social protest folk songs should have no trouble drawing a crowd at the Exit/In (10 pm). He’ll be awarded the First Amendment Center’s Free Speech Award at the Ryman’s big show on Wednesday, by far the youngest recipient of that honor.
WEDNESDAY
Given that Wednesday’s Honors & Awards, running from 6:30 til about 9:30, can accommodate about 2,200 patrons, there should be plenty of fans left over to catch the night’s abundant official showcases. Thoughtful and rough-hewn WMOT favorite Afton Wolfe spins his yarns at the 5 Spot (7 pm). Bass playing songwriter (and top tier singer) Adam Chaffins brings songs from his 2025 hard country EP Trailer Trash to The Basement at 9 pm. That’s a rich block of time, with Black Opry alum Jett Holden at the 5 Spot and North Carolina folk duo Viv & Riley at the Station Inn. Quirky alt-country bar band The Pink Stones brings a new album’s worth of material from Athens, GA with a set at Exit/In at 10 pm.
THURSDAY
Thursday night features quite a few Americanafest alums and all-time favorites like Hayes Carll (3rd & Lindsley, 8 pm), Amythyst Kiah (Exit/In, 8 pm), and S.G. Goodman (The Blue Room, 7 pm), along with the anticipated solo return of Amanda Shires (Exit/In, 7 pm). A bit more off the radar, check out Nashville’s veteran Cajun country cats Runner of the Woods at the 5 Spot (6 pm). The Wildmans are Virginia siblings who came up on the bluegrass and old-time circuit and who have now broken out with a creative indie hybrid on New West Records. They’ll put on a hot fiddle and electric-guitar driven show at the Basement East at 7 pm. Country-jazz charmer Sweet Megg sings at a new AMA venue, Odie’s in Midtown at 8 pm. Guitar genius Chris “Critter” Eldridge of Punch Brothers joins his folk singing vet wife Kristin Andreassen for a Station Inn show at 9 pm. There's an album in the works, but for now, it'll be songs made from nesting at home. Folk-rock band Palmyra are filling venues and threatening to become Virginia’s edgier version of the Avett Brothers, and this would be the time to catch them on the rise (at the Basement at 10 pm). Arrive early at 3rd & Lindsley if you want to see Tift Merritt, returning to the Americana scene after some quiet years mothering at home in NC (10 pm). She’s featuring a 20-year anniversary edition of her great Tamobourine album and a new release of demos that shaped that breakthrough.
FRIDAY
Americana has been good to bluegrass in recent years, so you can see the reigning IBMA Male Vocalist of the Year and traditional titan Danny Paisley with his band The Southern Grass at the Station Inn (7 pm). Also in that slot, north Georgia's The Band Loula has stirred up the kind of excitement that attended to the Civil Wars by way of their powerful yet tender male/female harmonies. They are Malachi Mills and Logan Simmons, singing at the Analog at 7 pm. Seattle songwriter Dean Johnson casts a mystical spell and engenders slavish fandom, so catch his keening voice and open-wound poetry at the Blue Room at 8 pm. If you miss her at our Throwdown on Tuesday, see elegant and earthy Canadian folk singer and multi-instrumentalist Meredith Moon at the City Winery Lounge (8pm). You’ll need a hit of the blues, and it should come from D.K. Harrell, Alligator Records’s new young hotshot from Louisiana. He’s burning it up at 3rd & Lindsley at 9 pm. West Texas artist Presley Haile brings charm and a lustrous voice to her layered country songs, which she’ll play at the Station Inn at 10 pm. Nightcap yourself by seeing what the astonishing singer and guitar picker Trey Hensley is doing as a solo act, now that he’s stepping away from his long-time duo with Rob Ickes. He’s at 3rd & Lindsley at 11 pm.
SATURDAY
Nashville’s Leslie Jordan has broken away from her successful run in Christian pop with her stunning secular debut The Agonist. The song cycle based on her estranged grandfather’s journals reveals a deep thinker and a lovely singer-songwriter with a knack for concept and collaboration. She’s my favorite discovery of the year, and she plays at 8 pm at the Analog. On the eve of a new documentary about her stomping ground the Palomino club in North Hollywood, the mighty Rosie Flores returns to Americanafest - three days after her 75th birthday! - with her signature western beat and rockabilly sound (3rd & Lindelsy, 9:30 pm). Grand Ole Opry favorite Mo Pitney and his pal John Meyer have teamed up for the bluegrass-leaning band Pitney Meyer. Their debut album is a favorite of ours, and it’ll be the backbone of their 10 pm set at the Station Inn. If you just can’t get enough, cap off your fest with the supergroup Guitar Party, featuring the intertwined, twanging magic of Guthrie Trapp, Tom Bukovac, Jedd Hughes (and friends). They’ll start at 10:30 at 3rd & Lindsley and have no official ending time.
