Multiple GRAMMY award winner, Carl Jackson, will be the featured musical guest during the radio broadcast of Thacker Mountain Radio as part of the DMI Anniversary Celebration on Saturday, March 31 at 3 p.m. in Studio A of the Delta Music Institute in the historic Whitfield Building on the Delta State University campus.
The Louisville, Miss. native was asked by Grand Ole Opry members Jim and Jesse McReynolds to join their band as a Virginia Boy at the age of fourteen. He played banjo for the McReynolds for five years before joining Glen Campbell’s band, where he worked as a banjo player for twelve years.
After leaving, Glen Campbell and striking out on his own, Jackson found himself working on recordings with the likes of EmmyLou Harris, Dwight Yoakam, Vince Gill, Ricky Skaggs, Steve Wariner, Garth Brooks, and Linda Rondstadt just to name a few; or having his songs recorded by such artists as Glen Campbell ("Letter to Home") to Garth Brooks ("Against The Grain" & "Fit For A King") and Trisha Yearwood ("Lonesome Dove”) to Patty Loveless ("You Don’t Know How Lucky You Are").
Jackson’s "Little Mountain Church House" was voted the 1990 International Bluegrass Music Association song of the year, and the beautiful ballad, "No Future In The Past", sung by Vince Gill, was named the #1 Country Song of the Year for 1993 by Radio & Records magazine. All in all, Jackson has had hundreds of his songs recorded, with sales in excess of forty million units. A poll conducted by Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine several years ago found Jackson to have written eight of the top 200 bluegrass songs of all time.
Jackson has also had a hand in the production of several great artists. His production work on the CD “Livin’, Lovin’, Losin’ – Songs Of The Louvin Brothers” was recognized as the 2003 GRAMMY winner for Country Album of the Year.
In October 2011, a unique project produced by Jackson was released to the public and is currently getting rave reviews across the country. “Mark Twain: Words & Music” tells the life story of the great Samuel Clemens and contains magical musical performances by Emmylou Harris, Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, Rhonda Vincent, Bradley Walker, The Church Sisters, Sheryl Crow, Brad Paisley, Marty Raybon, Val Storey, Vince Gill, Joe Diffie, and Ricky Skaggs, as well as narration by Garrison Keillor, along with Jimmy Buffet, as the voice of Huck Finn, and non-other than Clint Eastwood, as the legendary Mark Twain.
On December 2011, the state of Mississippi honored Jackson with an official Country Music Trail Marker in his hometown of Louisville, and in February 2012 he was awarded the coveted Governor’s Awards for Excellence in the Arts by the Mississippi Arts Commission.
The public is encouraged to come be a part of this entertaining broadcast on March 31 at 3 p.m. to support the Delta Music Institute. For more information on the Thacker in the Delta event, please call (662) 846-4579 or visit dmi.deltastate.edu.
