Country music legend Garth Brooks announced Wednesday that he will perform in Phoenix next month for the first time in 19 years.
Brooks, who retired from performing in 2000 before returning in 2014, is scheduled to perform two shows at US Airways Center (soon to be rechristened Talking Stick Resort Arena) on Friday, Oct. 23, and Saturday, Oct. 24. His wife, and fellow country music singer Trisha Yearwood will perform as well.
Tickets are scheduled to go on sale Sept. 11 at 10 a.m. with a limit of eight tickets per purchase.
Tickets will cost $59.08 but the total price will increase to about $75 after fees and charges are included.
With the release last year of “Man Against Machine,” the singer’s first new album since he topped the charts with “Scarecrow” in 2001, he edged out Elvis Presley to become the biggest-selling solo album artist of all-time in the United States with total sales of more than 135 million. No fewer than six of Brooks’ albums, “Sevens,” “No Fences,” “The Hits,” “Garth Brooks,” “Ropin’ the Wind” and the double album “Double Live,” have all gone 10-times-platinum.
In many way, Brooks paved the way for country music’s infiltration of the mainstream with an approach that draws as much on classic ’70s arena-rock as country.
As Rolling Stone summed up the legend’s impact and appeal in its most recent album guide, “Brooks personifies the kind of slick country music that took Nashville from its Southern working-class roots smack into the politically moderate values of Clinton-era middle-class America. The singer’s mix of country with ’70s-style singer-songwriter music, album-oriented rock and middle-of-the-road pop came just as the Baby Boom generation was looking beyond contemporary pop and classic rock for a new sound to grow old with. But Brooks’ music also resonates with younger heartland fans who fall outside the postpunk and urban demographics. The singer’s impact on popular music cannot be overestimated; his influence runs that deep.”
In the course of doing all that, Brooks has taken home two Grammys and 17 American Music Awards.
His hits include the country chart-toppers “If Tomorrow Never Comes,” “The Dance,” “Friends in Low Places,” “Unanswered Prayers,” “Two of a Kind, Workin’ on a Full House,” “The Thunder Rolls,” “What’s She Doing Now,” “The River,” “Somewhere Other Than the Night,” “That Summer” and “Ain’t Goin’ Down (‘Til the Sun Comes Up).” His most recent trip to No. 1 was “More Than a Memory” in 2007. His best-known song remains “Friends in Low Places.”