Last year Wayfarer Appalachia held its first Mountain Flavors Music & Food Festival on November 21 and 22, the weekend before Thanksgiving. This year it's November 6 and 7, one week after Halloween. Moving it two weeks earlier changes the shape of downtown Tazewell's fall. The two busiest Saturday nights on Main Street now fall back to back, and the same building at 386 Main Street sits at the center of both.
The first one is Halloween, Saturday, October 31.
Halloween puts two parties on the same block
Tazewell Today, the town's nonprofit Main Street organization, runs a trunk-or-treat on Main Street from 6 to 8 p.m. on Saturday, October 31. The Town of Tazewell's trick-or-treating hours fall on the same night, also 6 to 8 p.m. If you decorate a vehicle you can enter it in the contest. According to the Tazewell County Chamber's event listing, the best trunk wins $50 in Main Street Bucks, and gift certificates go to these categories:
- Spookiest Trunk
- Funniest Trunk
- Most Creative
- Best Halloween Theme
- Best Costume + Trunk Combo
- Best Tazewell-Themed Trunk
You register your trunk through that same chamber listing. The last category is the one with real local flavor, since it asks people to build a trunk around the town itself.
Wayfarer Appalachia, a few doors along Main Street at 386, has its own Halloween night planned for the same Saturday. It's billed as costumes, cocktails and a dance party with DJ Jordon, starting once the sun goes down. So families can work the trunks early in the evening, and the grown-up crowd has a reason to stay downtown after the candy buckets go home.
If your Halloween plans take you outside the town of Tazewell, two nearby towns have posted hours for the same night:
- Richlands: town-wide trick-or-treating, 5:30 to 8 p.m.
- Pocahontas: town-sponsored trunk-or-treating and trick-or-treating on Centre Street, 5:30 to 8 p.m.
Seven days later, the same address brings in the chefs
On the next Saturday the crowd heads back to 386 Main Street for a very different event. The second annual Mountain Flavors Music & Food Festival is split into two nights with two price points:
- Friday, November 6, 6 to 9 p.m.: a five-course dinner with live music, $150 per guest. Wayfarer calls the seating extremely limited.
- Saturday, November 7, 4 to 8 p.m.: a walk-around food, drink and music festival, $25 per person, with beer, wine, cooking demonstrations and live music all evening.
Tickets for both nights are sold through Wayfarer's event page.
The chef lineup is the same trio as the first year.
Chef Brian Duffy is from Philadelphia. His consulting company, Duffified Experience Group, has helped open and develop more than 100 restaurants around the world. TV viewers may know him from Bar Rescue, Beat Bobby Flay and Food Network's BBQ Brawl. He also created Duffified Spice.
Chef Kayla Robison cooks modern Appalachian and farm-to-table food built on seasonal ingredients. WVVA's 2025 preview connected her to Chopped.
Chef Kev D is billed as a celebrity chef and restaurateur known for his television appearances and high-energy cooking style.
The Saturday format lets you watch these chefs cook in front of you and then taste the results. That's the main reason the $25 ticket is worth considering even if the Friday dinner is out of reach.
The one open question is Friday's music. Wayfarer says the guests "will remain a secret for just a little longer." Last year's pick gives a sense of the level they aim for. WVVA reported that Grammy winner Gary Nichols played the 2025 dinner and that Blackbird Bakery handled dessert. In the same report, co-owner Donna Roberts described the Saturday festival this way: "the celebrity chefs will be making a variety of finger-type foods, you can walk around, have cocktails, try whiskey, try different beers." Blackbird Bakery's downtown and drive-through shops are both in Bristol, Virginia.
Why one building keeps showing up
Both Saturdays center on 386 Main because of what the building has become in barely over a year. Wayfarer moved into the former Painted Peak Brewing Company space and soft-opened in July 2025. It held its official ribbon-cutting in September 2025. Owners Donna Roberts and Chris Myers told WVVA they wanted to bring "Nashville to Tazewell." At that September 2025 ribbon-cutting covered by WVVA, Del. Will Morefield said:
"This is exactly the type of venue that is going to help attract new people into the region and I look forward to helping and watching them grow."
The building can host very different events because it has three music rooms. The Velvet Room is a small listening room, the Starlight Porch is outdoors, and the Crossroads Saloon is sized for a full band. That's how one address can hold a DJ dance party one Saturday and a chef-demo festival the next. Wayfarer's own description adds a restaurant, bar, event-rental space and mercantile to the music.
Eating on Main Street around both nights
Tickets to Mountain Flavors cover the food inside Wayfarer. Halloween is a different story, and so is a slow walk downtown before the Saturday festival opens at 4 p.m. Tazewell Today's business directory lists these options within a few blocks:
- Rosco's Soul Food, 203 Main Street
- The Happy Goat, 216 Main Street
- The Well Coffee Shop, 168 Main Street
- Back of the Dragon, 592 Main Street
- Bee Noodle'd, 124 Federal Avenue
Bee Noodle'd has a fall anniversary of its own. WVVA covered its move and grand opening weekend in November 2025, the same weekend as the first Mountain Flavors. Owner Erin Keene has run the family-owned restaurant since 2023 and expanded the menu past noodles into Southern dishes. The new space has honeycomb-style seating and a colorful bar on the second floor. Last year those two openings competed for the same weekend. This year they're two weeks apart.
If you're shopping between meals, the same directory lists Bohemian Grey at 145 Main, The Play Nook at 171 Main, Clothing Palette at 273 Main and Between Friends at 293 Main.
Late November goes to Bluefield, and the parade date is still unposted
With Mountain Flavors moved up, Saturday, November 21 belongs to a different town. That was last year's festival weekend, and this year the Town of Bluefield has its annual Christmas tree lighting that night at Jack Asbury Square. The town says more details are coming. The next Saturday, November 28, Bluefield holds its Christmas Market from 1 to 5 p.m. at Fincastle Ballroom, 1000 Country Club Drive. Vendor sign-up is still open.
The Town of Tazewell hasn't posted a 2026 date for its Christmas parade yet. The last two followed a pattern. The parade ran Saturday, December 7, 2024 at 4:30 p.m. and Saturday, December 6, 2025 at 5 p.m. Both were the first Saturday in December. The town's 2024 parade page also describes the tradition: the grand marshal lights the Christmas tree on Main Street before the parade continues. Until an official 2026 date goes up, the first weekend of December is a reasonable guess, but it isn't a confirmed date.
Richlands has already set its date. The town's events page lists its Christmas parade for Friday, December 4 at 6 p.m., starting at 1851 Cranwell Drive.
For downtown Tazewell, that leaves a clear calendar for the next few weeks: the trunk-or-treat and DJ Jordon on Saturday, October 31, chefs and live music at 386 Main the following weekend, then a quieter stretch until the tree lights up on Main Street.
Denise has been selling homes in Southwest Virginia since 1995, and she follows what's happening on Main Street in towns like Tazewell. Owners near downtown see how events like these shape their part of town. If you own a home within walking distance of Main Street and want to know where its value stands this fall, Denise Blevins can give you a straight answer. Get Your Instant Home Valuation, then call Denise when you want a local read on the number.
