(AP) – The first six shows of George Strait’s final tour are sold out. He calls it “incredible” and says he never expected the fans to react like this. He kicks off “The Cowboy Rides Away” tour on January 18th in Lubbock, Texas.
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(AP) – Dierks Bentley is gearing up for what he calls his “favorite thing” he does all year. He is holding his celebrity motorcycle ride and concert in Nashville on Sunday, October 14th to benefit sick children. And he’s getting a little help from friends Sheryl Crow, Chris Young and Brantley Gilbert. The “Miles and Music for Kids” event includes an hour long ride from Columbia, Tennessee, to downtown Nashville. Then the concert begins. Other participating artists include The Cadillac Black and Craig Campbell. Proceeds go to Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt.
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(AP) – The Oak Ridge Boys have been harmonizing for 40 years. And to help celebrate four decades in the music business the quartet will be kicking off “The Oak Ridge Boys 40th Anniversary Tour” early next year. The group also plans to release a commemorative album and a network television special is also in the works. The first concert of the U.S. and Canadian tour will be held January 19 at the historic Opera House in Galveston, Texas.
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(AP) – Jamey Johnson says the man who wrote country classics including “Make the World Go Away” influenced him not only as an artist and songwriter, but also as a person. He is paying his respects by releasing “Living For a Song: A Tribute to Hank Cochran” on October 16. Cochran died at age 74 in 2010 leaving behind a long list of admirers, many of whom join Johnson on the album. Among them, Willie Nelson, who says Cochran “was the best writer up there” and Merle Haggard who says Cochran wanted to be the “Hemingway of country music” and was. Among the artists featured on the tribute are Elvis Costello, Ronnie Dunn, Vince Gill, Emmylou Harris, Kris Kristofferson, Alison Krauss, Ray Price, Leon Russell, George Strait and Lee Ann Womack. Johnson will kick off the release of the album with a concert at Ryman Auditorium on the 16th, where he’ll be joined by several of his duet partners. He’s also expected to announce his fall tour sometime next week.
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(AP) – Tickets for the 2013 leg of George Strait’s final tour go on sale this Friday. Strait announced last month that he is riding away – not into the sunset – but he plans to stop touring after he wraps his current The Cowboy Rides Away tour. Strait has 21 dates scheduled for 2013 and 20 more in 2014. In September he told the AP he just doesn’t want to get to the point where he shows up and nobody else does.
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(AP) – Brad Paisley’s next album will feature a special custom-made guitar. It was given to him by Pennsylvania resident Lee Feldman who was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer last year. Feldman told Fox TV affiliate channel 43 in Harrisburg that he didn’t know what to do with the guitar, one of his most treasured possessions, but then he had a dream. It should go to Brad Paisley who he says could “play the frets off” of it. With the help of some friends in the music business Feldman, was able to personally hand over his guitar to Paisley who told him he’s planning on using it on his next album. Feldman says Paisley also revealed that his grandfather died from pancreatic cancer and that he was the one who taught Paisley “how to play guitar in the first place.” Feldman says he’s happy the guitar isn’t going to sit and collect dust. He says he wanted somebody to play it and now his wish will come true.
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(AP) – The next music Shania Twain records might have a holly, jolly jingle to it. She tells Up! Magazine that she’s been “dying to do a Christmas album for so long” and now is the best time to do that. Twain is launching her “Still The One” concert series in Las Vegas in December. She says once the show is underway, she’s going to get nostalgic and make the Christmas record happen.
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(AP) – Jason Aldean says his family is “OK” after a tabloid caught him kissing another woman at a bar in Hollywood. Aldean tells CMT that he has said what he needed to say to his wife and two daughters, and hopefully they understand that he knows he screwed up. He says now the family has to deal with the incident in private and try to fix it. Aldean and his wife Jessica have been married for 11 years. His new album “Night Train” is out October 16th.
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Live albums are commonplace today, but tape recording was in its infancy during country music legend Hank Williams’ lifetime. The equipment was cumbersome and tape was expensive, so very little live recording was done back then. Incredibly, two concerts performed by Williams were recorded in the months before his death and will be released for the first time as Hank Williams: The Lost Concerts Limited Collector’s Edition TODAY (Time Life).
Jett on what makes this album unique:
Jett on Dad’s Integrity:
Jett on Dad’s Music:
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(AP) – A new book by Dolly Parton is set for release in November. G.P. Putnam’s Sons, the publisher, announced the new book titled “Dream More.” It’s based on a commencement address Parton gave at the University of Memphis in 2009. During the speech Parton urged graduating students to “dream more” and take responsibility for making their dreams come true. The new book is described as a book of “inspirational wisdom.”
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(AP) – A dental infection is to blame for sending LeAnn Rimes to the hospital recently. She tweeted that she felt like she got hit in the right side of her face with a baseball bat and calls it the “WORST way ever to kick off a tour.” The illness forced her to postpone a show. Rimes blogged that she’s been dealing with painful dental issues for 10 months, but she’s getting back on track.
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(AP) – The lead singer of Edens Edge is a married woman. Hannah Blaylock tied the knot with Justin Wakefield during a quiet ceremony in the band’s home state of Arkansas. They exchanged vows under a White Oak tree decorated with fisherman’s rope and glass floats from Alaska, where Blaylock grew up. She walked down the aisle to a song her brother wrote about his wife called “Falling Over You.”
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(AP) – Brad Paisley is planning to donate a cow to a Massai tribe in Kenya. In 2007 Paisley bet a Detroit morning show radio producer that he couldn’t travel to 10 countries in 10 days. That producer headed to Africa with a big Brad cardboard cutout that became a hit in a Massai village near Mt. Kilimanjaro. Last week, Steve Grunwald, the roving radio producer, received a request from the Massai tribe for a cow. Grunwald reached out to Paisley for some help. During a radio interview that aired last week Paisley said he’s “totally game” and “all in.” It’s a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to help out” he says and offered to send Grunwald back to Kenya with a cow. The cow has already been named Paisley.
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