Vasti Jackson
and
Paul Thorn
to
Headline
Big Steam Blues &Roots Music Festival 2025
Back for year Four, Big Steam Blues & Roots Music festival will feature huge names in the Blues, Roots and R&B genre, with
Vasti Jackson and Paul Thorn
as the headliners for
Friday, September 26th & Saturday, September 27th, 2025.
Big Steam will take place in Hill Wheatley Plaza in beautiful downtown Hot Springs on September 26- 27, 2025. The festival will be free to attend, but VIP tickets will be available for purchase which include reserved seats and other perks.
Vasti Jackson
World renowned guitarist, and vocalist, Mississippi living blues legend, Cultural ambassador, 2012 Mississippi Musicians Hall of Fame inductee, and 2015 Albert King Lifetime Guitar Award recipient, Vasti Jackson is a powerful force in the world of music! With more than forty three years as a professional musician. As an artist, Vasti is known for sweat-drenched, soul-ripping live performances marked by some of the most stunning, and innovative guitar playing today. Vasti's stellar vocals, fiery guitar, and stage presence captures the audience, and leaves a lasting impression that celebrates the triumph of the blues, and the joy of rhythm that is soul satisfying to all that are lucky enough to experience his music.
Question: What does BB King, The Grammys, Harry Connick, Jr., Martin Scorsese, Wynton Marsalis, Dr. John, and Cassandra Wilson, have in common? Vasti Jackson!
Vasti (pronounced Vast-Eye) Jackson is a consummate performer, songwriter, arranger, and producer. From his early beginnings playing in churches, and juke joints in McComb, Mississippi, to festivals, Concerts, and theatres around the world. Vasti moves effortlessly from Blues to Soul to Jazz to Funk to gospel to pop, and beyond.
Before establishing himself as a purveyor of muscular American roots music, Tupelo, Mississippi’s Paul Thorn lived several other lives. The son of a Pentecostal preacher, he was a champion prizefighter in the 1980s who fought Roberto Duran, a professional skydiver, and a factory worker. Since releasing 1997′s Hammer & Nail for A&M, Thorn has balanced blues, rock, gospel, country, and soul in a singular strain of Americana with songs that embrace the human condition with their humor, irony, pathos, tenderness, heartbreak, grief, anger, and joy. Thorn possesses a singing voice that is equal parts gravel and honey. He is also an exhibiting painter. 2002′s Mission Temple Fireworks Stand garnered his first international exposure. His breakthrough was 2010′s charting Pimps & Preachers. 2014′s Too Blessed to Be Stressed offered what he called “positive anthem songs” and simultaneously placed on rock, indie, and Christian album charts. 2018′s Don't Let the Devil Ride featured several gospel songs that inspired him while growing up. It included guest spots by the Blind Boys of Alabama , the McCrary Sisters , Bonnie Bishop , and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band . It peaked at number one the Blues Albums Chart. In August 2021 Thorn released Never Too Late to Call, a collection of organic demos built into songs with producer Matt Ross-Spang. Thorn was born in Kenosha, Wisconsin, the son of a Pentecostal minister. His family moved to Tupelo when he was an infant. He spent his youth and adolescence singing in church and traveling with his dad to revivals. He picked up the guitar, organ, and piano along the way. The other big influence in his life was his father’s brother, a pimp.
He claims to have learned about the light and dark sides of life from each.
When it comes to songwriting, less is more, and simplicity is strength. Just ask Paul Thorn, who’s spent three decades turning soulful grooves and small syllables into songs that pack a big wallop. Maybe he learned the power of minimalism from his years as a pro boxer; maybe it just comes naturally. But whether he’s targeting heads, hearts, hips or the occasional funny bone, he somehow manages to condense large nuggets of wisdom into tight little mantras, the kind embroiderers stitched onto pillows before internet memes existed.
Thorn’s new album, Life is Just A Vapor, contains some beauties: “Life is a vapor, let’s live it while we can”; “tough times don’t last, but tough people do” (from “Tough Times Don’t Last”); “any mountain up ahead is just a hill” (from “Old Melodies”). They’re words of advice, comfort, support, encouragement, often meant to uplift, especially in times of struggle.“I like for people to be touched by music and get something from it, something that they can take with them throughout the day,” Thorn says. “Every song on this album, there's a message in it of some sort about how to live life.”
American Blues Scene writer Don Wilcock calls Thorn “an everyman (who) addresses things we all think about, but few can articulate with the kind of candor, humor and folksy truth that immediately endear him to almost everyone lucky enough to hear his music.”
Dozens of volunteers will be needed and, of course, sponsors as well. Anyone interested in being a part of this great event to keep the blues alive in Hot Springs should contact:
Joe Powell at info@bigsteammusicfestival.com
