In celebration of the former Beatle's career, Ringo Starr has announced a star-studded country music concert at Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium. A portion of the event’s proceeds will go towards the American Red Cross, in benefit of those affected by the recent Los Angeles wildfires.
Starr will be joined by former White Stripes front man Jack White and country music legend Sheryl Crow for the two-night event, taking place January 14th and 15th. The concert will air on CBS later this Spring, and will also be made available for streaming via Paramount+. The show itself is organized by T Bone Burnett, who produced Starr's latest country LP, Look Up; songs from both this new album and the Beatles' catalog are slated for the evening's set list.
Additional artists joining the trio will include Emmylou Harris, Larkin Poe, Billy Stings, Molly Tuttle, Brenda Lee, Sarah Jarosz, Jamey Johnson, The War and Treaty, and Mickey Guyton. Even more guests are expected to be announced for the January 15th show.
In a recent interview with the UK's Sunday Times, Starr expressed his lifelong interest in country music, including its impact on his hometown of Liverpool:
“Country’s been good to me. [My] idea of country is, ‘The dog’s dead and I don’t have enough money for the jukebox.’ Hundreds of records about the jukebox. I keep saying Liverpool was the capital of country music. In the streets I lived in every other house had some 18 to 25-year-old who was in the ‘merch’. And you could always tell those kids — there’d be a camel saddle in the living room because they’d been to Egypt. But they also went to America and came back with all the records, so we were getting them before everyone else.”
Look Up, Starr's first country album in over fifty years (and his first record since 2019), was released on January 10th - just three days after the start of L.A.'s disastrous wildfires. Tickets for the show are available here, and donations for those impacted by the 2025 California Wildfires can be made by visiting redcross.org, calling 1-800-RED CROSS (800-733-2767) or texting the word CAWILDFIRES to 90999.
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