{"id":150059,"date":"2025-06-19T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-19T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=150059"},"modified":"2025-06-18T17:38:18","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T22:38:18","slug":"stud-ford-returns-to-the-north-mississippi-hill-country-picnic-as-campground-stage-headliner-friday-june-27-2025-at-3-pm","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/stud-ford-returns-to-the-north-mississippi-hill-country-picnic-as-campground-stage-headliner-friday-june-27-2025-at-3-pm\/","title":{"rendered":"Stud Ford Returns to the North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic as Campground Stage Headliner Friday, June 27, 2025 at 3 pm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

by Davis Coen<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of many awaited returns to the North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic<\/strong> this year is Stud Ford<\/strong>, who will close out Friday\u2019s live music at the Campground Stage<\/strong>, starting at 3 pm along with Will Coppage<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even though Stud has been on the Main Stage in the past, mostly as a drummer with grandfather T-Model Ford<\/strong> and others, he will have a different role in 2025 as the Campground headliner for Friday, since relocating to Colorado and shifting focus to guitar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m looking forward to it,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m going to tear it down.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stud Ford shares a unique journey through his music and is deep rooted in the Delta and Hill Country traditions. Growing up in Greenville, Mississippi<\/strong>, he was introduced to a life of music at an early age by his grandfather and quickly found comfort and identity on stage through percussion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Stud is deeply influenced by T-Model and artists like R.L. Burnside, Junior Kimbrough<\/strong>, and Cedric Burnside<\/strong>\u2014who also played drums with his legendary grandfather.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He cut his teeth playing with blues notables such as Robert Belfour, Jimmy Duck Holmes, Kenny Brown, Lightnin\u2019 Malcolm<\/strong>, and Duwayne Burnside<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He recalled his first time on the Picnic stage at the original site in Potts Camp<\/strong>, Mississippi, as a child hitting a stick against a ride cymbal along with the great Paul Wine Jones<\/strong>, who told him to hit a tom, but young Stud was confused about exactly what piece to hit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a teenager he got inspired by watching some of the successful new generation of musicians in action, like Luther and Cody Dickinson<\/strong> of the North Mississippi Allstars<\/strong>, and was also able to go on a tour with them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLast time I saw those guys, I was about 15 years old. I remember just asking them questions about everything,\u201d he said with a laugh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I\u2019ve grown as an artist, and I\u2019m eager to show my peers and colleagues,\u201d said Stud. \u201cAnd of course, now I have way more stories to tell.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It will also be the first time for Coppage on the Picnic lineup, as the duo continues their Mississippi Shake Tour<\/em>, promoting their debut EP Ain\u2019t No Love<\/em>. Stud\u2019s experience with the Allstars along with his deep blues heritage have made his collaboration with Coppage a fresh, energetic sound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also from Greenville, Coppage knows Stud from the past but they weren\u2019t reintroduced until recently by a mutual friend; they then began blending their diverse backgrounds into one unique sound.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He describes their style as a mix of traditional blues, hip hop, rock, jam band, and singer-songwriter influences, although he\u2019s reluctant to use the word blues and stresses that music should transcend labels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBlues is just life,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Besides the title track, \u201cAin\u2019t No Love,\u201d Stud called the track \u201cShake\u201d another highlight of the EP, and also of the duo\u2019s live set.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be very interesting, being back,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m just ready to show them what I got. I hope they\u2019re proud of me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although it\u2019s been a while, Stud is ready to embrace the spirit of the Picnic. \u201cIt\u2019s just a sacred place. You can feel the blues and the soul.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Stud Ford and T-Model Ford at the North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic in 2006.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Stud Ford at the North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Stud Ford at the North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
Stud Ford Returns to the North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic as Campground Stage Headliner Friday, June 27, 2025 at 3 pm.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Davis Coen One of many awaited returns to the North Mississippi Hill Country Picnic this year is<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":123909,"featured_media":150066,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[321,32036],"tags":[32037,3531,4839,2270,1594,18537,2274,435,22723,32041,6690,5,1252,397,7067,32040,10555,909,2767,32038,1551,32039],"class_list":["post-150059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-localfestivals","category-north-mississippi-hill-country-picnic","tag-campground-stage","tag-cedric-burnside","tag-cody-dickinson","tag-duwayne-burnside","tag-greenville","tag-jimmy-duck-holmes-2","tag-junior-kimbrough","tag-kenny-brown","tag-lightnin-malcolm-3","tag-luther-and-cody-dickinson","tag-luther-dickinson","tag-mississippi","tag-north-mississippi-allstars","tag-north-mississippi-hill-country-picnic","tag-ole-miss","tag-paul-wine-jones","tag-potts-camp","tag-r-l-burnside","tag-robert-belfour","tag-stud-ford","tag-t-model-ford","tag-will-coppage"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/Stud-Ford-750.jpg?fit=750%2C864&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/123909"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=150059"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150059\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":150070,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150059\/revisions\/150070"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/150066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=150059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=150059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=150059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}