PHOENIX โ Back in the 1990s, when Garth Brooks was posting up a string of rocking No. 1 hits, multiplatinum record sales and breakneck concert sellouts, he would host a pre-concert press conference with the local media.
Twenty years later, he still holds press conferences, including one at Phoenix Childrenโs Hospital last Friday hours before he performed the first of six Arizona shows. He will perform four more times this weekend โ at 7 and 10:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 23, and Saturday, Oct. 24 โ at Talking Stick Resort Arena (formerly USAirways Center), 201 E. Jefferson St.
About a dozen reporters and photographers shared the Phoenix Childrenโs Child Life Zone with a dozen or so young patients, their parents and zone staffers. As much as he wanted to talk about his concerts, Brooks also wanted to shine a light on the center, which his foundation, Garth Brooksโ Teammates For Kids Foundation, created as a way for kids being treated at the hospitals to escape the routine of needles and tests and just be kids.
The Phoenix center is one of 11 the foundation โ which Brooks established with former Dallas Cowboy great Troy Aikman โ has opened nationwide. Other locations include Dallas, Denver, Indianapolis and New York, and the foundation now boasts participation by 3,000 professional athletes including baseball and football players.
Brooks and his country superstar wife Trisha Yearwood were actually late to the Friday press conference after meeting with some kids and their parents in the hospital. Yearwood said that that was the most rewarding and hardest part of coming to the Child Life Zone hospitals, seeing the parentsโ pain and the optimism and wondering how she would muster the courage if she was in their shoes.
โI donโt know how they do it,โ she said.
But Fridayโs meeting with the media was more about what to expect as Brooks made his triumphant return to Phoenix after a 19-year absence. Brooks left country music in late 2000 so that he could focus on raising his three daughters.
His shows last Friday and Saturday were sold out; there are still some single tickets scattered throughout the arena for this weekendโs concerts through Ticketmaster.
Brooks said that his wife encouraged him last year to return to touring after his youngest daughter left for college. He had done a casino residency in Las Vegas and a few one-off shows mostly for charitable causes, but had not toured since he was in his late 30s; heโs now 53.
โWhen we thought about would we put this tour together and would anyone show up, we were thinking if we get 50 percent of the numbers we did in the โ90s we would be very lucky, because the โ90s was a great lick for us,โ he said. โRight now weโre sitting at about 125 percent of what we did in the โ90s. To blow those numbers out of the water makes you feel really good, but to do it at 53 makes you feel a billion times better.โ
His shows are largely reminiscent of the ones he performed in his 1990s heydays, minus a few Chris LeDoux-inspired antics including catapulting across arenas on a cable. (See review from last Fridayโs show here.) On rare occasions, Yearwood said, her husband does find himself the object of spontaneous crowd surfing.
โBut I still want to ask every night when we get in the car, โAre you bleeding anywhere?โโ she said.
โAge starts to play in the picture,โ Brooks said. โI will give you a little hint: Instead of running around the stage, sometimes the stage runs around you. You can stand in one place and see everybody.โ
Brooks said he has been pleasantly surprised by the fan response to his tour, which he launched a year ago and has included multiple shows at each stop.
โIn the โ90s I donโt think I was ever ungrateful; I hope I never was,โ he said. โI always felt I was very lucky to get to do what I was getting to do. But thereโs a level of grateful now at this age thatโs crazy because when you look out there and see the people that you had hoped you would see again โฆ but then Ticketmaster is telling you that 48 percent of these people at this arena tonight were 10 years old or not born yet when you toured last time, thatโs pretty cool. That means the music has made the leap.โ
During the concerts, Yearwood and Brooks perform a duet and Yearwood, a multiplatinum-selling country artist on her own, performs a short solo set.
โI was surprised because married to Garth Brooks, everyone is so excited to see him and I never want to be, โOh great, weโre going to listen to the wife for 45 minutes.โ I never wanted to be that girl,โ she said during the press conference. โSo Iโm lovinโ the way the Garth fans have embraced me. โฆ From the moment I step out there and the moment I say goodbye, it just feels good. โฆ Before I was nervous, but now I just know itโs going to be fun.โ
Yearwood said that her husband casts a large shadow thatโs hard to follow.
โHeโs the party. Heโs that guy that when he walks into the room it gets fun, no matter what. Thatโs the way it is, I think, in these arenas. I see the faces of the folks and it just seems like everybody is there for the right reasons and having a good time,โ she said. โBut even when weโre not touring and weโre home, I wake up in the morning and heโs right there like a puppy. Heโs still the party. Heโs not swinging around an arena. Heโs like, โWhat are we going to do now?โ Heโs that guy and I love that guy and I hope youโre always that guy,โ she added, speaking directly to Brooks.
The world tour moves to Salt Lake City next weekend and then California for shows in San Diego and San Jose before an early December run in Wichita, Kansas.
