Willie Nelson is going on his annual Outlaw Music Festival tour this summer, and Bob Dylan is at all 26 concerts. They will be accompanied on the first stage by Robert Plant & Alison Krauss and on the second by John Mellencamp. Billy Strings, Brittney Spencer, Celisse and Southern Avenue will also play with them on various stops. It starts on June 21st in Alpharetta, Georgia.
“This year’s Outlaw Music Festival Tour promises to be the biggest and best yet with this lineup of legendary artists,” Nelson said in a statement. “I’m thrilled to be back on tour with my family and friends, playing the music we love for the fans we love.”
Dylan joined the 2017 Outlaw Festival for a few shows, but this is his first time taking part in the full tour. However, his friendship with Nelson goes back several decades. They wrote the song “Heartland” together in 1993.
“[Willie] is like a philosophical poet,” Dylan said that year. “He quickly gets to the heart of the matter. He puts it out there and then it’s over. He leaves it to the listeners to think about it. His guitar playing is pretty phenomenal. I don’t see anyone recognizing him as a musician. In my opinion he is at the forefront. He takes what he sings and makes it his. There aren’t many people who can do that.”
During the summer of 2004, Nelson and Dylan played together at minor league baseball parks across America. In 2009 they brought John Mellencamp with them as they iterated on the concept. Dylan rarely appears on stage with other artists, but in 2004 he frequently brought Nelson along for duets on “I Shall Be Released,” “Heartland” and “Milk Cow Blues.” They first performed together in 1976, when Nelson opened for “Gotta Travel On” during a Rolling Thunder Revue stop in Houston.
In recent years, Dylan’s tours in America have largely been limited to intimate theaters. But in the summer of 2013 he went on an amphitheater tour with Wilco and My Morning Jacket. “The whole concept of the tour was collaborative,” My Morning Jacket frontman Jim James told Rolling Stone a few months after the tour ended. “We expected to sit around the campfire with Dylan at 2 a.m. and say, ‘Let’s play all of Desire tomorrow!’ We all had these fantasies.”
However, James and Jeff Tweedy of Wilco had the opportunity to play with Dylan a few times. They were brought out near the end of his set for the band’s traditional folk song “Twelve Gates to the City” and “The Weight.” “His bass player Tony [Garnier] agreed with us about who should sing which verse,” says James. “They literally changed keys a minute before we started, e.g. B. ‘Bob wants to sing it in E flat’. That was really cool and something I can still tell my grandchildren about.
If we’re lucky this summer, we might see Dylan, Nelson, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss play a few songs together. Plant played “Girl From the North Country” at many concerts in the early 2000s. This could be his chance to play it with the man who wrote it.
Here are the dates and program for the 2024 Outlaw Musical Festival, produced by Blackbird Presents. Tickets go on sale Friday, March 1st at 10 a.m. local time.
Friday, June 21, 2024
Ameris Bank Amphitheater, Alpharetta, GA
Willie Nelson & family
Bob Dylan
Robert Plant and Alison Krauss
Celisse
Saturday June 22, 2024
PNC Bandstand, Charlotte, NC
Willie Nelson & family
Bob Dylan
Robert Plant and Alison Krauss
Celisse