Robert Earl Keen Announces Free Hometown Concert, Expands Tour
The summertime heat is already descending upon Texas, and with it Lone Star singer-songwriter Robert Earl Keen, who has announced his annual free hometown show on the Fourth of July.
Keen, a tireless touring artist who already undertook a wintertime jaunt earlier this year with old friend and fellow Texas A&M alum Lyle Lovett, will headline Kerrville’s 4th on the River celebration in Kerrville, Texas. The small Hill Country town has been Keen’s home for nearly three decades and this year played host to his benefit concert for the Hill Country Youth Orchestra. The Fourth of July concert marks the sixth edition of Keen’s free Independence Day festival.
The Texas country trailblazer has also added tour dates outside of his home state, including stops in Wyoming, Colorado, Montana, Utah and Idaho. Keen will also reunite once more with Lovett in December when the pair make a previously announced appearance with George Strait during his residency at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
An inductee of the Texas Heritage Songwriters Hall of Fame, the 62-year-old is due to receive the Distinguished Alumna Award from his alma mater in 2018. “I’m at the best level of celebrity in the world. I can go anywhere I want to and nobody ever really recognizes me unless I talk,” Keen told Rolling Stone Country in a profile published last month. “It’s what my wife calls ‘playing the Earl card.’ I go, ‘Hi, I’m Robert Keen,’ and [people] go, ‘Oh, OK, nice to see you.’ Then I say, ‘Robert Earl Keen,’ and they go, ‘Oh!'”
Here are Robert Earl Keen’s expanded schedule of 2018 tour dates:
June 8 – Fort Worth, Texas @ Billy Bob’s
June 15 – Tulsa, Oklahoma @ Cain’s Ballroom
June 16 – Lacygne, Kansas @ Tumbleweed Music Festival
June 17 – Indianapolis, Indiana @ HI-FI
June 19 – Alexandria, Virginia @ The Birchmere Music Hall
June 20 – Portsmouth, New Hampshire @ Prescott Park
June 21 – South Burlington, Vermont @ Higher Ground Ballroom
June 23 – Norfolk, Connecticut @ Infinity Hall
June 24 – Westerly, Rhode Island @ Knickerbocker Café
June 25 – Richmond, Virginia @ The National
June 26 – Rocky Mount, Virginia @ Harvester Performance Center
June 30 – Stafford, Texas @ Redneck Country Club
July 4 – Kerrville, Texas @ Kerrville’s 4th on the River
July 15 – Greenfield, Massachusetts @ Green River Festival
July 25 – Jackson, Wyoming @ Teton County Fair Grounds
July 27 – Denver, Colorado @ Levitt Pavilion
August 10 – Bozeman, Montana @ MSU – Oval Field
August 11 – Challis, Idaho @ Braun Brothers Reunion
August 12 – South Salt Lake City, Utah @ The CommonWealth Room
August 25 – Galveston Island, Texas @ The Grand 1894 Opera House
September 7 – Brevard, North Carolina @ Mountain Song Festival
December 7-8 – Las Vegas, Nevada @ T-Mobile Arena (with Lyle Lovett)