Luke Bryan called off his Farm Tour show in Latrobe, Pennsylvania hours before doors on 17 September, telling fans on Instagram that the field at 1846 Farms would not take it. "This call was made for everyone's safety," he wrote, apologising and asking ticket holders to hang on to their tickets and parking passes while his team worked out what came next.
The show was expected to bring roughly 20,000 people to the Latrobe area, with Dasha and Kenny Whitmire on the bill. The Stas family, who farm the site, had cleared around 30 acres to take the stage, the vendors and the parking, which is the scale of preparation a Farm Tour date asks of the people hosting it.
Aleisha Stas, the general manager at 1846 Farms, told CBS the call was Bryan's and that she agreed with it. She said the ground was too soft to hold millions of dollars of equipment or to park on safely, with a real risk of vehicles sliding and people falling. This is the life of the American farmer, she added, and no amount of work beats the weather.
Three days later the same thing happened again, 400 miles west. On 19 September Bryan's team announced that the following day's show at John Schaendorf Dairy Farms in Allegan, Michigan was off, after heavy rainfall left that field unsafe too. The statement carried the same line about safety on the grounds, and his website again told fans to hold their tickets while a reschedule is explored.
Bryan had planned four Farm Tour dates this autumn and played two of them. Millersport, Ohio went ahead at Miller Family Farm on 18 September and Brookston, Indiana followed at Prairie View Farms on 19 September. Allegan was meant to close the run. Weather has cut into his year before, and wildfires already pushed back his Washington shows earlier in the calendar.
The cancellations landed either side of a release. Signs, his ninth studio album, came out on 18 September, a twelve-song record he had spent the past year on, trailed by the Top 10 radio single Country And She Knows It along with Word On The Street and Fish Hunt Golf Drink. He put out the full track list in the run-up.
Reschedules, when they are announced, will show up on the tour guide with the rest of the country touring calendar.
The facts
- Luke Bryan cancelled the 17 September Farm Tour show at 1846 Farms in Latrobe, Pennsylvania.
- The venue's general manager, Aleisha Stas, said the ground was too soft for equipment and parking.
- About 20,000 people were expected, with Dasha and Kenny Whitmire on the bill.
- A second date, 20 September at John Schaendorf Dairy Farms in Allegan, Michigan, was cancelled after heavy rain.
- Two of the four Farm Tour dates planned for this autumn did not go ahead.
- The shows he played were Millersport, Ohio on 18 September and Brookston, Indiana on 19 September.
- Ticket holders have been told to keep their tickets while a reschedule is worked out.
- His ninth album, Signs, came out on 18 September with twelve songs.
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