Organizers for the annual Pilgrimage Music & Cultural Festival, set in Franklin, Tenn., are skipping the fest for 2026, with plans to return with “something bigger, something better, something brighter” in 2027, according to an Instagram post shared on March 25.
The Instagram video announcement noted, “11 years of memories, of magic, of music…now something new is blooming.” Meanwhile, the video was captioned with, “New sights, new sounds, new surprises! This move will allow us to bring you the best festival experience. We can’t wait to see you next year!”
No other details were given regarding nixing the 2026 fest, or regarding the plans for 2027’s festival.
Better Than Ezra frontman Kevin Griffin co-founded the festival along with Brandt Wood and Michael Whelan. Pilgrimage Music & Cultural Festival launched in 2015, headlined by artists including Cage The Elephant, Willie Nelson and Wilco, all performing at The Park at Harlinsdale Farm in Franklin. The 2016 installment of Pilgrimage featured performances from Beck, Jason Isbell, and Daryl Hall & John Oates. Since then, the festival has always prioritized a blend of country, rock, folk, and Americana sounds, with other artists performing at the fest over the years including Chris Stapleton, Zach Bryan, Foo Fighters and The Lumineers.
In 2015, Griffin told Billboard about how he took inspiration from New Orleans Jazz Fest when dreaming up the idea for the Pilgrimage festival.
“Jazz Fest has huge tents on the main stages that look unlike any other festival. It has a very bucolic, rural look to it and we’re taking that idea,” Griffin said at the time. “All the partners in Pilgrimage grew up in New Orleans going to Jazz Fest and having gone to a lot of festivals around the country and world I realized that model of a multi-genre day festival with a big emphasis on food and drinks and art really wasn’t done the way Jazz Fest does it. It hadn’t been done many places outside New Orleans. So that was really the emphasis behind Pilgrimage.”
Last year’s festival featured performances from Kings of Leon, John Mayer, Turnpike Troubadours, Better Than Ezra, American Aquarium and Sam Barber.
