Alan Jackson
#
48
Ranking
Hall of Famer
BIRTHDATE
BIRTHPLACE
Newnan
,
GA
,
USA
67
6
'
4
"
Alan Jackson is a Newnan, Georgia-born country legend who went from working as a Dairy Queen-meeting, forklift-driving blue-collar Georgian to recording 35 number-one singles, earning three CMA Entertainer of the Year awards, and becoming a Country Music Hall of Famer, before announcing his retirement from touring and inviting more than 50,000 fans and a who's-who of country music royalty to his sold-out farewell concert "Last Call: One More for the Road – The Finale" at Nashville's Nissan Stadium on June 27, 2026.
Current Tour & Setlist
Jackson's "Last Call: One More for the Road – The Finale," the final full-length concert of his touring career, takes place June 27, 2026, at Nissan Stadium in Nashville before an expected crowd of more than 50,000 fans, with Jackson saying he chose Nashville because "we just felt like we had to end it all where it all started for me." The sold-out all-star farewell features performances from George Strait, Lainey Wilson, Luke Combs, Carrie Underwood, Eric Church, Miranda Lambert, Luke Bryan, Thomas Rhett, Little Big Town, Cody Johnson, Riley Green, Jon Pardi, Jake Owen, Lee Ann Womack, and Keith Urban, with his retirement from touring driven in part by his 2021 public disclosure of Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a degenerative nerve condition that has made extended touring increasingly difficult.
Early Life
Born Alan Eugene Jackson on October 17, 1958, in Newnan, Georgia, the youngest of five children and the only boy, he grew up in a tiny home his father built around his grandfather's old toolshed on a nine-acre family farm where virtually every aunt, grandmother, and cousin lived within walking distance, giving him what he later called an unusually tight-knit rural upbringing rooted in humility, hard work, and faith. His mother Ruth passed along a deep love of country and gospel music, his father Eugene taught him to restore old cars, and at 16 his parents scraped together $50 to buy him his first guitar, leading to his first public performance at 17 in a school production of Oklahoma and the formation of his first band Dixie Steel, while he worked a long series of blue-collar jobs from shoe repair clerk to forklift operator to construction worker to keep himself afloat.
Career Highlights
The turning point in Jackson's career came in 1985 when his wife Denise, working as a flight attendant, happened to sit next to country legend Glen Campbell on a flight, handed him Alan's demo tape, and secured him a songwriting deal with Campbell's publishing company, prompting the couple to pack up a U-Haul and drive to Nashville with little more than a dream. In 1989 Jackson became the first artist ever signed to the newly formed Arista Nashville, released his debut single "Blue Blooded Woman" and debut album "Here in the Real World" that same year, and launched one of the most commercially consistent careers in country music history, recording over 35 number-one singles across more than three decades. His catalog of 21 studio albums includes landmark records like "Don't Rock the Jukebox," "A Lot About Livin'," and "Who I Am," while his post-September 11 tribute "Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)" became one of the most emotionally significant songs in country history, earning him a Grammy and three CMA Awards including three Entertainer of the Year honors, and he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2017.
Family & Personal Life
Jackson met his wife Denise at a Dairy Queen in Newnan when both were teenagers, married her on December 15, 1979, and the couple has remained together for more than 45 years despite a period of marital strain in the 1990s that Denise later chronicled in her 2007 memoir "It's All About Him." They have three daughters. Mattie Denise (born June 19, 1990), Alexandra Jane (born August 23, 1993), and Dani Grace (born August 28, 1993), and all three daughters were pregnant simultaneously at Christmas 2025, a moment Jackson celebrated publicly on Instagram as the family prepared to welcome three new grandchildren to join their existing two grandsons.
