Nashville, Tennessee – June 29, 2015 – Country music’s biggest yearly event, the CMA music festival, ended two weeks ago. A week jam packed with musical activities organized for the fans is the highlight for many that travel far and wide to be in the country music capitol, Nashville.
One of the yearly events that always attracts attention is Darius & Friends. Held at the famous Wildhorse Saloon the show was, like it has been for six years, a benefit for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital put on by Grand Ole Opry member Darius Rucker. And like always it was a sold out evening featuring many of Darius’ friends. Which weren’t announced until a week before the doors opened. But knowing Darius everybody knew the line up was going to be amazing no matter what. And they were right! The line up included: Steve Wariner , Scotty McCreery, Brothers Osborne, A Thousand Horses, Brett Eldredge and Little Big Town.
The South Carolina native opened up the show himself, playing several of his hits before introducing each one of his guests. While his amazing band, The Carolina Grey Boys, stayed on stage to play with every single artist, Darius joined in for a song several times. He joined A Thousand Horses for a cover of the Black Crowes’ “Hard to Handle” , joined Steve Wariner for the Beatles’ “Get Back” and came out with a a horn section so he and new friend Eldredge could explore their mutual love of Frank Sinatra with covers of “Come Fly With Me” and “That’s Life.”
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The show finished with Darius singing “Purple Rain”, a song he’s been ending his American shows with for a while now (he replaced it with Oasis’ “Don’t look back in anger” during his European tour), and which he said he will he will retire after this performance.
Before we all knew it the show was over and all the artists came on stage one more time to sing “Wagonwheel” togetherer. Once again it was an amazing show and seeing these friends play music together and having a great time is what it’s all about.
The day after the concert Darius also hosted a golf tournament for St. Jude and the combined they raised more than $220,000 for the treatment and research of childhood cancer and other life threatening diseases at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.