Billy Strings Announces 2025 Spring / Summer Tour
Billy Strings is one of the biggest things in live music in this generation, irrespective of genre. The fact that he’s a bluegrass artist at heart makes his wild popularity that more inexplicable, and exciting. His latest album Highway Prayers released last September had many singing his praises. Now they can’t wait to get out and see him perform live where he starts in bluegrass, and then explores the universe beyond.
Billy could probably sell out stadiums at this point. But instead of placing his music in a cavernous space where he’s so detached from the audience, he’s continuing to opt for arenas and amphitheaters, and doubling, and sometimes tripling up dates to accommodate demand. That’s the case for many of his newly added dates for the Spring / Summer of 2025.
He’ll be spending most of his time in the South and Midwest, with stops in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Michigan, Virginia, Illinois, Missouri, and Kentucky. But don’t worry all you folks in the Rockies and West Coast, you can be assured Billy will be heading your way at some point in 2025.
The bold dates below are all on sale Friday, January 10th. You can sign up for presale access at billystrings.com.
Billy Strings Tour Dates:
bold = new date
January 24 — Denver, CO — Ball Arena
January 25 — Denver, CO — Ball Arena
January 26 — Denver, CO — Ball Arena
February 6 — Asheville, NC — ExploreAsheville.com Arena (SOLD OUT)
February 7 — Asheville, NC — ExploreAsheville.com Arena (SOLD OUT)
February 8 — Asheville, NC — ExploreAsheville.com Arena (SOLD OUT)
February 14 — Asheville, NC — ExploreAsheville.com Arena (SOLD OUT)
February 15 — Asheville, NC — ExploreAsheville.com Arena (SOLD OUT)
February 16 — Asheville, NC — ExploreAsheville.com Arena (SOLD OUT)
February 21 — Atlanta, GA — State Farm Arena
February 22 — Atlanta, GA — State Farm Arena
February 28 — Nashville, TN — Bridgestone Arena
March 1 — Nashville, TN — Bridgestone Arena
March 2 — Nashville, TN — Ryman Auditorium (SOLD OUT)
April 3 — St. Augustine, FL — St. Augustine Amphitheatre
April 4 — St. Augustine, FL — St. Augustine Amphitheatre
April 5 — St. Augustine, FL — St. Augustine Amphitheatre
April 9 — Tampa, FL — Yuengling Center
April 11 — Savannah, GA — Enmarket Arena
April 12 — Savannah, GA — Enmarket Arena
April 15 — Charlottesville, VA — John Paul Jones Arena
April 17 — Cary, NC — Koka Booth Amphitheatre
April 18 — Cary, NC — Koka Booth Amphitheatre
April 19 — Cary, NC — Koka Booth Amphitheatre
May 30 — Grand Rapids, MI — Van Andel Arena
May 31 — Grand Rapids, MI — Van Andel Arena
June 6 — Rosemont, IL — Allstate Arena
June 7 — Rosemont, IL — Allstate Arena
June 11 — Kansas City, MO — T-Mobile Center
June 13 — St. Louis, MO — Chaifetz Arena
June 14 — St. Louis, MO — Chaifetz Arena
June 20 — Lexington, KY — Rupp Arena
June 21 — Lexington, KY — Rupp Arena
January 7, 2025 @ 8:25 pm
Billy Strings live is an experience. Every show stands on its own. I’ve been to a dozen shows. Every single one is top notch. A total dedicated musician and professional always. He deserves the success. His mgmt team and business plan just seems exemplary. Keeps tickets reasonable. Reasonable to allow for multi show passes when he plays multi dates. Fan focused. He is going to be an icon.
January 7, 2025 @ 8:37 pm
Yes, whether it’s Tyler Childers, Zach Bryan, the Turnpike Troubadours return, etc., tickets were so hard to come by. By increasing supply, you ensure all your fans get to see you, and at a reasonable price. More artists should do this.
January 8, 2025 @ 6:39 am
I tried to get 3-day passes for the first weekend in Asheville on 3 days and still wasn’t able to get them. I’ve been to about 15-20 shows by now and this is the first time where I completely struck out. I was in the online waiting room each day, Wednesday for the presale, Thursday which was for Western NC residents only (zip code verified when you checkout), and the general sale on Friday. I know a few people that tried for a single night and were able to get tickets, but I couldn’t get any of the 3-day passes.
January 7, 2025 @ 10:50 pm
You also get fans buying tickets for multiple nights by keeping it affordable and desirable. The other thing about Billy is he just seems like a good human being. That along with charisma, talent, and showmanship. I’ve been sold for a long time now. He knows his success is selling tickets. I believe he is going to be bigger than phish. Which is top tier in the world big. He just seems so much more relatable to the masses. Again I think icon status is coming. The model is similar. Billy just isn’t really jam band. Similar but different what he does. There is lot of instrumentation but so much of it is orchestrated than improvisation. Idk he is just an artist that really impresses me and obviously many others
January 7, 2025 @ 11:29 pm
Caught my 1st Billy show in NOLA on 12/29. Seats were great, Row 6 just above GA, for $60/tixket. After the show I wished I’d bought tickets for the full 3 night run.
I’d listened to a couple shows on nugs.net getting a feel for a live show, but even that could only give glimpses of what I experienced in that arena. I’m sold!
January 8, 2025 @ 9:22 am
I both love and simultaneously don’t understand Billy Strings.
On the one hand, back during the height of Bro Country I always said that the Country Music Savior with the Lefty Frizzell tattoo and the Ira Louvin belt buckle didn’t exist.
Billy Strings is the closest person to what i imagined a country music savior would look like.
He knows all the old songs like Pig in a Pen and Knoxville girl, Slew foot, eight more miles to loiusville… etc.
Yes, I’m aware Billy Strings is technically a bluegrass player but let’s not dicker over the apostrophes
But i grew up around Billy Strings, I probably knew about Billy and jammed with him before anyone in the comments section or the media knew he existed.
If you’d asked me in 2014 if Billy Strings would ever go anywhere, I’d have said no way, Jose.
Not because Billy Strings isn’t good, but because I thought audiences and the masses couldn’t appreciate the material.
I didn’t think there was an audience who wanted to hear Pig in a Pen.
Now… that’s why I struggle to understand the appeal of Billy Strings.
Partly because while i was growing up and learning music, playing pig in a pen was a one way ticket to the nuthouse and the white coats would run every test they could to find out what defect in one’s head made them like a song like pig in a pen or two dollar bill.
So suddenly Billy Strings is out there playing all those songs I didn’t think the masses even appreciated anymore.
And the other thing that I grapple with, watching the meteoric rise of Billy Strings, is that when it comes to country music, and bluegrass, i learned not to cast pearls before swine.
Nothing has ever been made better by more people finding out about it.
Star Wars… fire emblem… country music as eveidenced by twenty years of taylor swift and blake shelton et al
So seeing Bluegrass become mainstream is… a little disconcerting because Ive learned to equate popularity with decline in quality.
It will be interesting to see if the popularity of Billy Strings results in the rise of more legitimate bluegrass artists to the top of their fields and more real musicians playing real folk songs or if we enter into an era of “Bro-grass” where the untalented clowns who heretofore made shoddy country music now make shoddy bluegrass.
January 8, 2025 @ 11:00 am
He kinda reverse Taylor Swifted in a way. He didn’t get all those fans by playing Pig in a Pen, he got em by making a play for all the Deadheads that needed a new flagship now that the Dead have lived up to their name. Once he got all the hippies hooked, THEN he hit em with the Doc Watson.
So far at least it’s been a positive thing for traditional music, at least in NC/SWVA/east TN, cause a bunch of those folks are now showing up for the people like me that only play Pig in a Pen and Sally Ann. Sure they’re a little annoying sometimes, but the more people listening the better.
January 8, 2025 @ 11:19 am
I’m well aware of some of Billy’s ‘out there’ stuff.
I’m totally cool with out there stuff. I like music as diverse as Charlie Parker, Dream Theatre, Brother Oswald and the Katamari Damacy soundtrack.
BUT i worry when prominent artists bring in fans from diverse backgrounds because having an influx of fans who aren’t steeped in the culture, traditions and history of something results in an influx of content that deviates from the same culture traditions and history.
We see this played out with adaptations of Thundercats that ‘arent meant for existing thundercats fans’
RPGs that aren’t meant for people who play rpgs
‘Country’ music that isn’t really country except for references to corn and trucks
Now hear me out: I don’t think Grateful Dead fans are going to ruin bluegrass. if anything, they already like bluegrass (or at least folk and traditional music) Jerry Garcia was well known for dabbling in the genre. even playing with it’s leading artists.
BUT whatever happened to the fickle fans of flash in the pan artists who polluted country music? FGL… Sam Hunt… Luke Bryan?
Many of those fans have obviously moved on to the next big thing. but what are they listening to? top forty pop? classic rock? the next big thing like fgl was?
Billy Strings a big thing who is new and shiny.
What exactly can we do to ensure that a generation of people following a trend don’t start saying ‘bluegrass needs to change’ the way we had that in country music with fgl and blake shelton saying ‘old farts and jackasses’
I highly doubt those boots and flannel and blue jeans truck fans switched to rap and pop and hip hop. one of the draws of pop country and country hick-hop was that it was all the sounds of pop and rap without all the obvious drug and crime references that a roughly middle class white consumer is inherently less likely to consume.
Which is to say, I think the average fgl fan is more likely to listen to a billy strings than a NWA album.
Anyone care to chime in? anyone noticing any patterns or trends in consumption/popularity that i haven’t?
January 8, 2025 @ 2:39 pm
Fuzzy, fans of Luke Bryan, Sam Hunt, FGL etc tend to be young women who wear daisy duke’s, cowgirl boots, and like to shake it and be seen. Of course that group has aged a bit, so I guess it’s more moms now. But then again there were middle aged White Claw guzzling women into it.
My point is, they are NOT flocking to Strings in droves. Strings fans tend to be more rock centric people who either were fans of Jam- bands or fans of the prototypical guitar hero music. Strings scratches the guitar hero itch for many. Also, he is popular with Americana fans as well. And there are to be found classic country fans in the mix. A lot of gray hair actually at a Strings show alongside their grandkids.
The traditional grass crowd by and large is indifferent to him. Why? Because they like the scene as is, with small intimate festivals where you can sit comfortably without mosh pits and drug popping loons dancing about. I’m referring to the little fests all over the Midwest and the south, where the big names are Rhonda Vincent, Dailey and Vincent, Larry Cordle, Blue Highway, Hensley and Ickes , Joe Mullins, and so on. These are where you find the devoted tradgrass base. Thats what I see anyway.
I think Strings is building a life-long fanbase that exists apart from the trad- grass base, and at some point it’ll be interesting to see if trad-grass continues to grow as a movement or maybe fades out a bit. The real deal people in it don’t want it to grow gigantically, they like their scene the way it is.
For Billy Strings, he’s in uncharted territory, selling arenas and raking in that cash in truckloads. A whole nother animal entirely. Who would have thought an acoustic flat picker could be a rock star?!
January 8, 2025 @ 5:39 pm
“The traditional grass crowd by and large is indifferent to him.”
They go nuts for Billy Strings at DelFest. That’s where he got his early breaks in the scene 2017-2019.
Strings is well received at any and every Doc Watson tribute festival:
https://youtu.be/Nk4SWmDbMNI?si=ESHo0Fi0d0L8idy-
Although there’s always a friendly bluegrass vs newgrass debate ongoing between bases, I feel traditionalist (at least in Appalachia) have more than embraced Strings. Just listen to how Del McCoury, Jerry Douglas, and Rick Skaggs gush about Strings.
January 9, 2025 @ 8:55 am
Yeah you have a good point, he’s still too new for it to have happened yet, but I’m sure there’s a wave of Billy-influenced acts coming. Will they have the appreciation for the true blue stuff that he does? I hope so.
Or mebbe some of the more traditional acts will bend that way to try and grow their fanbase? Town Mountain and some other bands have taken a hard country turn in the past couple years to try and capitalize on that wave.
Kevin Smith’s guitar hero point is a good one, a lot of “BMFS” fans I’ve talked to are really invested in the idea that Billy his the best bluegrass guitar player alive.
So far it’s been a positive thing I think. If only cause the trad base is dying out, and we gotta make gas money somehow to keep performing.
Backing off newgrass for a minute, in this modern disconnected world where people are so clearly hungry for something real, I keep thinking there’s gotta be an easier way to feed oneself on the old-time music than learning competition tunes and trying to place at single convention. Mebbe some sort of rich people house party circuit, as it don’t translate to stages so good. . I don’t know any rich people though.
January 8, 2025 @ 4:17 pm
Here’s the thing, Billy Strings is way more metal than Deadhead. He admits he didn’t start listening to the Grateful Dead until almost mid-20’s. But in high school, he was a metal guy. Strings on the stage with Tool whirling his hair is more natural fit for him than him filling in for John Mayer or Sturgill Simpson (true Deadheads) with the remaining members of the Grateful Dead.
https://youtu.be/bXau3ewTHcM?si=y-dDan44_M7UN_KD
January 9, 2025 @ 7:01 am
Hoptown,
Experiences within the trad- grass community will vary depending on where you are geographically. In the region I’m referring to, it’s a completely different vibe than you will find at DelFest or MerleFest or Telluride. The fests I’m referring to get zero media coverage, you have to know about them to discover them. The crowds are smaller, there’s no pit to dance in, everybody sits in lawn chairs, there’s no jamgrass,you bring your own food. and the fanbase likes it that way. Not saying there aren’t exceptions, there always are, but in general when I talk to the people in this scene, I usually ask them their take on Billy. I haven’t heard too many rude remarks, but the common response is ” he’s great, but it’s not our scene, or ” not what we are doing” or ” he’s way bigger than our events”. And the fans of this scene will travel to other like- minded events, but only a handful will probably go to a Strings show.
Yes, musicians like Skaggs and McCoury do embrace him, it’s true. Musicians are more open minded than many fans in that regard. Honestly, DelFest has a heavy amount of more non- traditional artists.
The more you explore the trad- grass world the more fragmented you will find it to be. West coast grassers are yet a different bunch entirely. I only speak based on my experience.
January 9, 2025 @ 11:54 am
We’ve seen a lot of comments over the last week or two about how Billy Strings has this fan base, and Sierra Ferrell has that fan base, and Zach Top has a completely different one. That is not my experience at all, and the reason I believe you HAVE to get out in the field and see how music reacts within the audience to truly understand it. I was at the Under The Big Sky Fest in Montana this summer with 20,000 other people when Billy Strings invited both Zach Top and Sierra Ferrell on the stage with him. The crowd went nuts. Do they all have slightly different fan bases? Of course. Is there significant overlap? Of course there is. I just don’t see the value in lumping people into “these kinds of people” and “those kinds of people” bundles when it comes to music. Music is for breaking down those barriers. Of course there are some bluegrass traditionalists that look down their nose at Billy Strings. But that’s their loss. His last record was 90% pure bluegrass, and his album before that was 100% traditional bluegrass. If you go watch him on a given night, the performance will be 50%-90% pure bluegrass. And I would recommend EVERYONE go see Billy Strings live. If you can’t get over potentially standing beside a dirty hippie for the show, that’s your loss. Billy’s a once-in-a-lifetime live performer, and people need to get over if some artist doesn’t fit neatly in someone’s stereotypical demographic. Get out and enjoy great music. And right now, there’s a lot of great music from a lot of different “country” influences, and I think it all blends together well.
January 8, 2025 @ 12:18 pm
Being knee deep in bluegrass its awesome to see the crowds gather to these old standards being played. Hopefully, these kids will start to notice who Doc, Rice, Crowe and Martin are.
January 8, 2025 @ 10:03 am
We’d sure like to see Billy somewhere on the West Coast, for example, in Seattle. I love watching him an YouTube, but live would be so much better!
January 8, 2025 @ 11:32 am
He is a great talent and I hope he tours the UK at some stage. Loved his Live album and Highway Prayers. He might well be able to sell out a stadium but I wonder whether his show would suffer in a stadium. I would be interested in the thoughts who have seen him live. How good is his show in a large arena?
January 8, 2025 @ 4:22 pm
I thought becoming a new father would give Strings the excuse to not tour in 2025! The man can’t sit still.
Look at all those Asheville dates! I think a couple are makeups from Hurricane Helene. I wonder if any one of those shows will go to benefit the region. If I lived in Asheville, I’d find a way to attend all 6!
January 9, 2025 @ 8:43 am
He did do a big benefit concert already, we love him for it. It’s really bad here still.
January 9, 2025 @ 3:16 pm
Cack, are you in NC?
I love the area. Was really shocked about the damage. Wife and I are fond of the region, we love Black Mountain, stayed there last year. It’s likely that Air BnB cabin is no more sadly. I think it was in the path of that flood.
January 9, 2025 @ 4:40 pm
Yessir. It’s astounding. A vet I was running four-wheelers with said it felt like Iraq. Black Mountain’s a great town, I love it too. The cabin might still be there, more of Black Mountain survived than Swannanoa, but if it was downhill of State St. then yeah it’s most likely gone. They’ve been kicking butt rebuilding though. Make it back sometime! The music’s still good.
January 9, 2025 @ 6:39 pm
Love Black Mountain!
We were in Shelby, with PPG, along with Lexington.
Our son was born in Thomasville.
Dr. Richard M. Dacus III, one of the best ob/gyn’s ever.
Tell everyone in your circle that a lot of us out here have been praying and thinking of all of our N.C. friends, with love.
You guys are positively resilient.
January 10, 2025 @ 2:47 pm
Thanks DI.
January 10, 2025 @ 2:55 pm
I live in Grand Rapids, Michigan – less than an hour away from where Billy Strings grew up. In the past 18 months, he’s sold out the local 12,000-seat arena on Halloween ‘23, sat in for a gig with his high-school metal buddies at a nearby 400-seat club, jammed with Greensky Bluegrass at our 2,000-seat outdoor amphitheater, and guested with Phish for 2 nights at the arena. (Not to mention what turned out to be an unfounded rumor that he’d pop up at Sierra Ferrell’s amphitheater show.)
We Michiganders do love our hometown heroes, even when they move on to other pastures. (Bob Seger, Jack White & Greta Van Fleet are all around Nashville now.). So Billy’s ongoing presence and his return to GR for this May’s shows is welcome – especially for a newbie who didn’t understand what the hoopla was all about until I heard Live v. 1 & Highway Prayers. Tickets bought; thanks for the heads-up!
January 11, 2025 @ 11:59 pm
Love all these thoughtful comments. Think all of you are right!
Me Deadhead since 79, Phish since 87, Strings only since 23!
But folk and southern rock since 75 or earlier falling asleep to FM radio under my pillow, and country and blue grass always there the whole ride.
The most important thing is Billy, and the whole band it must be remembered, are supremely talented. They know the old tunes and are not afraid to showcase them, and, as a very early knowing phish devotee, Stings takes the music to places the aforementioned have not. Drugs are not needed to hear this. Sure, electronics are involved, but the knowledge of the songs, the Canon of music, the practice and skills, structure and notes, these folks can play, and I believe the popularity will help build audiences for a number of genres and scenes, give bluegrass a shot in the arm, because it’s a huge mass of the roots of this country and Strings is reaching folks and stirring cultural memory.
We just got tickets for Savannah. Family trip of me, the only Yankee Nutmeg state liberal preppy, flyin in from Cali, the others sisters and cousins, ex military, trumpers and Christians, Carolinaians and homeland Georgians, pooling cash and cars and hotel points to have us a good ole time together. Hooch and gummies, and faces hurting from smiling so much.
Thanks to saving country music.com for having the info I needed when strings site was wonky. Helped us get the presale tics.
See you at a show. I’ll be the bald guy your sweety isn’t afraid to dance with in the aisle.