Ellington

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — The Mississippi Blues Trail is going international.

Mississippi has erected more than 150 Blues Trail markers to highlight the music and its influence on Mississippi. A marker to be unveiled Friday in Notodden, Norway, is the first international marker. It will be unveiled during the 25th Annual Notodden Blues Festival.

Alex Thomas, with the Mississippi Development Authority's tourism division, says the marker reinforces the global influence of a genre born in Mississippi.

The Notodden Blues Festival has hosted dozens of artists from Mississippi. In 1996, Notodden and Clarksdale, Miss., became sister cities with cultural exchanges including performances by Norwegian artists at Clarksdale's annual Sunflower River Blues and Gospel Festival.