Rock Candy Tours’ Co-Founders: Jessica Walden and Jamie Weatherford

Rock Candy Tours’ founders Jessica and Jamie with son Walden at Grant’s Lounge

 

About

Rock Candy Tours is a guided tour company that specializes in showcasing the spirit and legacy of Macon, Georgia’s rich music history. We also offer guided food, beer and ghosts tours of Downtown Macon.  

Once home to artists like Little Richard, Otis Redding, James Brown and the Allman Brothers Band, Macon was listed among legendary studio engineer Tom Dowd’s “Five M’s” of music towns, joined by Manhattan, Miami, Memphis and Muscle Shoals.

Jessica Walden and Jamie Weatherford officially founded Rock Candy Tours in June 2011, the day after the Georgia Music Hall of Fame closed. They founded their company on the passionate belief that Macon’s storied history didn’t have to live in a museum but already existed on its sidewalks, street corners and historic structures. And if our walls could talk, they would sing!

Macon native Jessica Walden was raised in the shadows of rhythm and blues and the after-shocks of southern rock, a music legacy credited to her late uncle Phil Walden and his younger brother (her father), Alan. 

Jessica shares her life and passion for Macon with her husband, Jamie Weatherford, a third generation, local candy manufacturer and passionate music historian.

Together, they are joined by a team of experienced tour guides, bona fide experts who enjoy sharing their deep-seated excitement and knowledge of Macon, Georgia.

Through family stories and extensive research, Rock Candy Tours was created with the hopes to honor, preserve, protect and downright show-off some of the most fascinating and colorful sites in the South. These are the stories that music — and more! — are made of!

Rock Candy Tours offers weekly guided public tours and customized private guided tours for any size group. 

Rock Candy Tours’ first official tour launched from Washington Park in the Spring of 2011.

Since creating Rock Candy Tours, Jessica and Jamie have conducted nearly 1,000 tours to visitors, locals and VIPs in their beloved community of Macon.

Their music history tours have received statewide recognition and national media attention through outlets like National Geographic, C-Span and National Public Radio.