New music festival to bring Grammy winners to Mebane | Arts & Entertainment

The City of Mebane, Mebane Historical Museum (MHM), and volunteers from throughout the community are getting ready to host the inaugural Hook & Line: Thompson Music & Arts Heritage Festival on October 10-11, 2025, which will feature live performances by Grammy Award-winning artists Rhiannon Giddens and Justin Robinson.

The festival celebrates the legacy of Joe and Odell Thompson, first cousins and lifelong Mebane residents who are widely known for being pioneers of “old-time music”, a string-based genre with roots in African American folk tradition.

In addition to a day of live old-time music on the Fiddler Stage at Mebane’s Community Park, the Hook & Line Festival lineup will feature:  

• A panel discussion about the history and heritage behind old-time music

• A community square dance at Mebane Arts and Community Center (MACC)

• Art exhibitions at the MACC and Flight Tea Bar in downtown Mebane

• The official dedication of “Knee to Knee,” a life-size sculpture of Joe and Odell Thompson playing the fiddle and banjo near the Fiddler Stage. (In 2020, the City of Mebane and MHM partnered in the installation of the sculpture, but the unveiling was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.)

Joe and Odell Thompson grew up playing old-time music at Saturday night square dances, including standards such as “Hook & Line,” and later performed for crowds at venues and events such as Carnegie Hall and the National Folk Festival. 

In 1991, the duo received the North Carolina Folk Heritage Award for their role in preserving African American string music tradition, and in 2007, Joe Thompson received an Arts Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. They have both passed away.

During their lives, the Thompsons inspired countless numbers of young artists to embrace and continue the tradition of old-time music. In his later years, Joe Thompson mentored Giddens, Robinson, and their band, The Carolina Chocolate Drops, who went on to earn the Grammy Award for Best Traditional Folk Album with their former band, The Carolina Chocolate Drops.  

 Robinson and Giddens, who also won a Pulitzer Prize for Music for co-writing the opera, Omar, will participate in the Hook & Line Festival panel discussion as well as perform on the Fiddler Stage.  

This festival of community, music, art, and heritage welcomes everyone.  The event is free to attend. Space is limited. For more information about the festival, including parking and other services, please go to www.hookandline.org.