The weather can play such a strange role in our lives — sometimes threatening, sometimes so beautiful it is surreal.

This weekend was one of those scenarios. The highly-anticipated Mississippi Bicentennial Celebration Governor’s Concert was held Saturday evening on the Ole Miss campus and please allow us to just say that it was spectacular.

We could have done with a little less of the Elvis impersonator and more Gospel as an exchange, but the four-hour program — yes, it ran precisely four hours from start-to-finish — was so delightful that we wish more could have seen it.

And that was the plan, until the weather stepped in.

Originally planned for the Ford Center on the Ole Miss campus, a perfect venue except that it has a limited number of seats, the concert was moved to The Grove so that all who wanted to see the concert could.

But then along comes a tropical depression and state officials moved the concert from The Grove back to the indoor environs of the Ford Center. The call on making the move had to be done days before the concert since it was still anybody’s guess how the weather would turn out.Would the storm move through quickly and stall and drown us out for a couple of days?

Forecast models were unclear days out.

Friday was quite stormy in Oxford when the storm passed through, but by Saturday, the day of the concert, our North Mississippi region was basking in low humidity, sunny skies and a gentle breeze from the North that begged us outside.

Inside, however, Marty Stuart and his Fabulous Superlatives closed out a memorable Governor’s concert. We’re just sorry that more couldn’t see it. But we can thank the fickle follies of Mother Nature for that.