Racks By The Tracks, a Saturday festival packed with great music, ribs and beer tasting, returns to Kingsport this weekend for its sixth year. The event has grown from 450 attendees in its first year to over 9,500 in 2012 and is now hosted at the Farmer's Market in downtown Kingsport. The event has raised tens of thousands of dollars in past years for many local non-profit organizations. This year's festival will benefit the Sullivan County Humane Society and Relay For Life among others.
Platinum-selling country group Diamond Rio will headline this year's Racks By The Tracks Festival. Music begins at noon with Mac Arnold & Plate Full O' Blues, followed by Adam Bolt, Hundred Acres, The Billy Crawford Band, and Webb Wilder leading up to Diamond Rio who takes the stage at 8:00 pm. Local favorites the Benny Wilson Band will close out the entertainment for the evening at 9:30 pm.
Event headliner Diamond Rio has sold over 10 million albums earning three platinum and five gold records. They've won the CMA award for Vocal Group of the Year four times and received 30 Grammy nominations. They became the first group in the history of country music to have a debut single reach #1 with their 1991 hit "Meet In The Middle." Diamond Rio has placed 32 more singles on the Billboard country music chart since, including "How Your Love Makes Me Feel," "Norma Jean Riley," "Beautiful Mess," "Love A Little Stronger," and "One More Day."
This year's craft beer tasting, taking place from 2:00 pm until 7:00 pm, will be expanded to include 80 percent of all beers that have never been featured in Tri-Cities beer tasting. A gravity beer tasting section is a new addition to the festival for 2013. Thirty restaurants will compete in this year's People's Choice BBQ Awards.
Cumulus Broadcasting (101.5 WQUT, Great Country 104.9, 640 WXSM), Holston Valley Broadcasting (ABC 19 WKPT TV, WAPK TV) and WJHL TV / 11 Connects are this year's media sponsors. Also look for staff from TriCitiesNights.com and VIP SEEN Magazine to capture the great time you'll have at the festival.
Tickets can be purchased on the festival's website at http://www.racksbythetracks.com/tickets.
