Halos & Horns Tour

Infobox concert tour
concert_tour_name = Halos & Horns Tour


image_caption =Dolly performing at Irving Plaza for the Halos & Horns Tour.
artist = Dolly Parton
start_date = May 17 2002
end_date = December 14 2002
number_of_legs = 2
number_of_shows = 18 in United States
7 in Europe
25 in total
last_tour = ?
this_tour = Halos & Horns Tour
(2002)
next_tour = Hello I'm Dolly Tour
(2004)

The Halos & Horns Tour in 2002 was Dolly Parton's first major concert trek in 10 years. It promoted the release of her album "Halos & Horns". The tour started in North America, moved to the British Isles, before returning to North America once again.

History

In the early 1990s Dolly Parton had stopped the grueling tour schedule that she had worked for most of her career; she was tired of it and did not see it fit to keep a band on payroll. She continued to do casino shows in Atlantic City and Las Vegas, Vegas and she also performed (usually) yearly themed concerts at her Dollywood theme park.

With the resurgence of sorts of her career in 1999 with the release of the album "The Grass Is Blue", Parton toyed with the idea of mounting a tour to promote the album. Scheduling conflicts with the many talented, and booked, musicians who played on the album prohibited the tour and the subsequent one which would have promoted the 2001 album "Little Sparrow". Parton did do some promotional concerts for the albums. She also appeared at the famed MerleFest at Wilkes Community College in Wilkesboro, North Carolina on April 28, 2001, and performed a set list that comprised songs from the two albums as well as her greatest hits.

Then it was announced at Dollywood's opening weekend in April 2002, that Dolly would release a new album, "Halos & Horns", and would launch her first tour in a decade.

The tour was promoted and produced by House of Blues. The venues were mainly club settings and seated somewhere between 1,000 and 2,500. Subsequently, every date on the tour sold out. Most reviews praised Parton and her recent bluegrass/folk releases.

The show

Parton stated in interviews to promote the album and tour that the shows she would be performing would be very simple. There was no glitz or lights or video monitors that she had employed with her earlier tours in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Most of the songs that made up the set list were of the country/bluegrass/folk vein, though Parton did include her biggest pop hits in an a cappella medley. "9 to 5" was treated to a very stripped down, bluegrass treatment, garnering mixed reviews from fans.

Tour dates

North America leg

British Isles leg

et list

The set list for the shows was comprised mostly of songs from Parton's previous three Sugar Hill releases. It remained essentially the same, though song orders were rearranged as the tour wore on and Parton added songs here and there.

The main setlist was,

#Orange Blossom Special
#Train Train
#The Grass Is Blue
#Mountain Angel
#Shine
#Little Sparrow
#Rocky Top
#My Tennessee Mountain Home
#Coat of Many Colors
#Smoky Mountain Memories
#Applejack
#Marry Me
#Halos & Horns
#I'm Gone
#Dagger Through the Heart
#If
#9 to 5
#Jolene
#A cappella-medley (Islands in the Stream, Here You Come Again, Why'd You Come In Here Lookin' Like That, Two Doors Down)
#After the Goldrush
#I Will Always Love You

Songs that were performed at some shows, but not all,

*Color Me America
*Calm on the Water
*Try
*Down from Dover
*Silly Song Medley (I Don't Wanna Throw Rice, He's a Go Getter, I'll Oilwells Love You)
*Stairway to Heaven

References

* [http://www.dollymania.net/hnhpress.html Dollymania page on tour press release]
* [http://www.villagevoice.com/music/0229,sotc,36575,22.html Village Voice review]