More than four decades after he “rode in on a song,” George Strait, the “King of Country Music,” returned to his throne on Friday night — in this case, center stage at Nashville’s Nissan Stadium — as he played his first-ever headlining concert at the venue, and the first in a doubleheader of shows slated for July 28 and 29.
Earlier in the evening, the guitar-wielding, golden-throated Chris Stapleton — one of the evening’s two openers alongside superb vocal group Little Big Town — told the crowd, “I’m not going to do a whole lot of talking; I’m going to play a whole lot of music in the time that we have,” as his thundering voice brought seemingly effortless gravitas to a 17-song set that included “Parachute,” “Nobody to Blame,” “Fire Away,” “Starting Over” “Tennessee Whiskey” and “White Horse,” a new bluesy-rocker from his upcoming November release Higher, that already sounds like a classic.
That same ethos of letting the songs, the stories and the voice take center stage equally applied to Strait himself, who led the packed audience in nearly three dozen songs into his 120-minute headlining set. At 71, Strait’s proud Texas twang and earnest vocal delivery is still in fine form.
“What a great audience you are tonight,” the three-time CMA entertainer of the year said. “Been looking forward to this for months… It’s good to be back in Nashville,” he said, leading into “How ‘Bout Them Cowgirls.”
Strait brought the Texas heat with him in more ways than one, as temperatures lingered near the nineties well after sunset, and he held court before the packed crowd, rarely straying far from the center stage microphone and letting hit song after hit song waft over the crowd and into the warm Tennessee night.
Though with 44 Billboard Hot Country Songs chart-toppers to his credit, it’s a formidable challenge to fit in every classic Strait hit. But Friday evening, like on so many of his concerts, he essentially offer his own Eras Tour, leading a well-curated, decade-spanning set of songs. There was his 1981 debut single, the top 10 hit “Unwound,” and No. 1 hits from the 1980s including 1985’s “The Chair” and 1987’s “Ocean Front Property.” He offered the 1990s hits “Check Yes or No,” “Write This Down,” and “I Can Still Make Cheyenne,” 2008’s “Troubadour” and 2019’s “The Weight of the Badge.”
Though he primarily sailed from one hit into another, he took a moment to set up “The Weight of the Badge,” dedicating the song to “all you men and women out there waring the badge.” He added, “I want to thank you for being there when we need you… sometimes laying your own lives down for ours,” drawing the applause of the crowd. “I held one of those badges one time and I was surprised how light it was. I thought, ‘it’s light until you put it on, and then it becomes really heavy.”
With a set list this packed with hits, Strait did what he does best — offer an no-frills run of songs with no need for pyrotechnics, dazzling lights or frenetic dance moves. Strait, his signature cowboy hat, starched jeans and pearl snap shirt, trusty acoustic guitar and tight-knit Ace in the Hole band were all that was required to keep the capacity crowd on its feet, singing and swaying along until the last note. They sang faithfully to “Give It Away,” and swayed along with the fiddle-drenched western swing of the Bob Wills classic “Take Me Back to Tulsa,” and the mournful “Milk Cow Blues.”
Whether the audience members had followed Strait’s career since its early days, or if they hadn’t even been born when Strait had his first hits, it didn’t matter: they had absorbed the songs, the lyrics, the legend.
“I’ve been asked what my favorite song is that I’ve ever recorded,” Strait said at one point. “I have to say this one,” he said, launching into 1983’s “Amarillo By Morning.”
Though straightforward, the show was anything but stale, as this seasoned performer peppered the concert with a few surprises. Throughout the night, Strait punctuated the set with more covers, paying homage to many of his musical heroes, including a rendition of Merle Haggard’s “Misery and Gin” (“I miss him so much,” Strait said).
Stapleton joined Strait for a trio of songs including a cover of the 1983 Merle Haggard and Willie Nelson classic “Pancho and Lefty,” with Stapleton’s gravelly voice offering a perfect foil for Strait’s smooth, pure twang.
“It’s hot. I’d rather be hot than cold,” Strait, his own pearl snap soaked in sweat, told the crowd with a grin, before offering up a story about his longtime friend and fellow musician Stapleton. “Chris and I have been friends for a while. Back in the day, I recorded a couple of his songs. You might know one of them,” he said, referring to his 2011 hit “Love’s Gonna Make It Alright,” “But you might not know this one,” he added, before he and Stapleton traded lines on “You Don’t Know What You’re Missing,” a song from Strait’s 2013 album Love Is Everything. They followed with Strait’s aforementioned 2011 hit.
Another special moment during the evening came as Strait welcomed U.S. military sergeant Derrell Kingsberry to the stage, to honor him by teaming with the Military Warriors Support Foundation Home for Wounded Heroes to make Kingsberry the recipient of a new home.
“Thank you so much for your service,” Strait said. This marks the 108th home Strait has been part of helping to give away to deserving military personnel. From there, Strait launched into Haggard’s “The Fightin’ Side of Me.”
Elsewhere in the evening, Strait’s easygoing camaraderie with the audience also brought a few lighthearted moments, as at one point he heard a fan yell out in adoration and he responded, “I love you, too.”
He ended his set with that 1981 debut, “Unwound,” before walking the edges of the stage, waving to the crowd with his signature smile, bowing several times and pointing to the audience.
“Thank y’all for being such a great audience tonight. We had a great time. Adios, goodnight everybody,” he said. Undeterred and not ready for the evening to conclude, the audience stood to its feet, cell phones lighting up the crowd, and coaxed the legendary performer back to the stage for an encore — not that Strait needed much coaxing.
“I wasn’t ready to go either,” he said. He gave a musical shoutout to his own tequila brand Codigo with a song of the same name, before offering up “All My Exes Live in Texas,” a cover of Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues,” and later wrapping his set with his 1985 hit “The Cowboy Rides Away,” giving another nod to his Ace in the Hole band and thanking the crowd.
“The Cowboy Rides Away”‘s opening line state, “I knew the stakes were high right from the start,” a notion that’s true in love and in the music business. But over the past four decades, Strait has not only beat the odds of a fickle industry, but became a standard-bearer, by keeping a laser focus on what matters most: the music, and artistry, and the fans.
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