Willie Nelson to Perform in Boone
Concert at Holmes Center February 19

Music legend Willie Nelson, whose career spans six decades and includes more than 200 albums, will perform with Asleep at the Wheel at Appalachian State University’s Holmes Convocation Center Feb. 19 at 8 p.m. Doors open at 7 p.m. 

The concert will mark Willie Nelson’s first appearance in Boone since performing at An Appalachian Summer Festival in the mid-1990s.

Tickets are $35 for floor seating, $28 for lower level seating and $22 for upper level seating. Tickets are available online at www.theholmescenter.com and at the Holmes Center Box Office by calling 828-262-7890.

The concert will support the release of the CD collaboration “Willie and the Wheel,” to be released in early February 2009. A concept 30 years in the making, the new recording is a collection of classic western swing songs handpicked by the late Jerry Wexler.

In addition to songs from the new album, the concert will feature classics written by Nelson.

The iconic Texan is the creative genius behind classic recordings such as “Crazy,” “Hello Walls,” “Red Headed Stranger” and “Stardust.” His music career spans six decades and his catalog boasts more than 200 albums.

Nelson is a thriving, relevant and progressive musical and cultural force. He recently launched the record label Bismeaux Records, toured with Merle Haggard and Ray Price in the Last of the Breed Tour, and headlined with Farm Aid, an event he co-founded in 1985. He also continues to promote environmental awareness by producing and using his own blend of biodiesel fuel.

In 2003 Columbia/Legacy Records released “The Essential Willie Nelson,” which spans his earliest recordings as well as the celebrated Island/Def Jam Records material. “Willie Live & Kickin’” hit stores following his top-rated USA Network Memorial Day cable special that year as well. The album includes guest vocalists ranging from Norah Jones to Toby Keith, with whom Nelson performed his No. 1 single “Beer For My Horses.”

Nelson pushed the boundaries of traditional music genres with the release of 2005’s “Countryman,” his first ever reggae set, and 2006’s “Songbird,” produced by Ryan Adams. Included on “Countryman” are two Jimmy Cliff covers and the Johnny Cash/June Carter Cash penned “I’m A Worried Man” along with reggae-styled versions of songs written by Nelson. “Songbird” includes originals by Nelson and Adams along with a wide range of covers including ones by Leonard Cohen, Gram Parsons, the Grateful Dead and Christine McVie.

The March 2006 release of “You Don’t Know Me: The Songs of Cindy Walker,” a collection of 13 classics written by Country Music Hall of Fame songwriter Cindy Walker, earned Nelson a Grammy nomination for Best Country Album. The award augmented a career that has been recognized with eight Grammies, a President’s Merit Award, a Grammy Legend Award and the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award.

In 2004, Nelson received the Academy of Country Music’s prestigious Gene Weed Special Achievement Award honoring Nelson’s “unprecedented and genre-defying contributions to popular music over his nearly 50-year career.”

In 2007 Broadcast Music Inc. (BMI) named Nelson a BMI Icon, declaring that his “ascendance to internationally renowned treasure is a singular path marked by self-belief and musical brilliance.”

For more information on this concert call ASU Student Programs at (828) 262-3032. To order tickets, call the Holmes Center Box Office at (828) 262-6603.