Legendary jam band founder comes to Alabama: “Guitar virtuoso” announces new solo tour

Phish fans will have the opportunity to see Trey Anastasio up close – relatively speaking – when the jam band founder launches his solo tour in 2025.

Anastasio, a guitarist and singer, has announced 20 dates for “acoustic evening” shows, including a March 22 concert at the Alabama Theater in Birmingham. Tickets for the 2:30 p.m. show will be available beginning Friday, December 6 at 10 a.m. CT through Ticketmaster. The Alabama Theater, 1817 Third Ave. North, offers space for around 2,500 people.

Advance sales for the Birmingham date begin at 10 a.m. CT on Thursday, December 5, according to the Ticketmaster listing. There is also a pre-sale for Anastasio’s fans via his website. Although Ticketmaster pricing for the show has not yet been announced, Anastasio presale tickets (which began on Wednesday, December 4) were priced at $58.20 and $68.50.

Birmingham is the only Alabama stop on Anastasio’s tour, which runs March 8, 2025 through April 5, 2025. Several other Southern cities are on the schedule, including New Orleans (March 21, Saenger Theater); Nashville (March 23, Ryman Auditorium); Savannah, Georgia (March 29, Johnny Mercer Theater); and Knoxville, Tennessee (April 1, Tennessee Theater).

According to a publicist, the tour will be Anastasio’s “first extensive solo acoustic tour” since 2019. According to a Setlist.fm review, Anastasio played “intimate, stripped-down versions of Phish cuts” on this tour, becoming “even more personal.” He interacted with the audience and shared stories from his 36-year career.”

Anastasio, 60, is best known as the affable, wildly talented frontman of Phish, but he has also found recognition for his side projects.

“As a solo artist, Anastasio has released over two dozen studio and live albums and has toured extensively with the Trey Anastasio Band, Classic TAB and other iterations,” reads a press release about his tour. “In 2020, Anastasio recorded and released the pandemic-era album “Lonely Trip,” followed by his first album of solo acoustic material “Mercy” in 2022. Anastasio’s latest release is “Atriums,” a six-chapter album Song suite of ambient instrumental guitar compositions originally conceived and recorded for Phish’s Sphere Run (in Las Vegas).”

Jam band fans in Alabama don’t need to be convinced by Anastasio, however. He has performed here several times with Phish and has visited outdoor venues such as the Oak Mountain Amphitheater in Pelham, the Orion Amphitheater in Huntsville, the Mercedes-Benz Amphitheater in Tuscaloosa and the Wharf Amphitheater in Orange Beach.

“As a guitarist, Anastasio is underrated outside of the jam band world,” said AL.com’s Matt Wake in a review of Orion’s 2023 show. “During the band’s first of two sets at the summer tour opener He did some acid blues Hendrix type stuff that shook my soul. At other times its lines were enchanting and playful, bouncing between the grooves like a dragonfly gliding across the surface of the water. It takes a special guitarist to bring around a thousand people into ecstasy at the same time. Anastasio did this several times on Tuesday evening.”

READ: Review of the start of the Phish summer tour 2023: The jam band lords deliver an epic show

In recent years, Anastasio has performed with the Trey Anastasio Band in Birmingham and played sold-out shows at the Iron City in 2013 and 2018. (In a review of the 2013 concert in Iron City, AL.com’s Madison Underwood called Anastasio a “guitar virtuoso” and described his solos as “elegant.”) Classic TAB was on the lineup for the 2010 Hangout Fest in Gulf Shores.

As far as we know, Anastasio’s performance at the Alabama Theater marks his solo acoustic debut at the venue and his first solo acoustic concert in Birmingham.

“I learned that a good song always works acoustically, even solo,” said Anastasio in an interview with Rolling Stone in 2024. “And a lot of producers have tried to tell me that since I started 40 years ago. For example, I made a record with Brendan O’Brien and he said, “Sit on a stool and play me the songs.” We won’t go into the studio until you have a song that you can sing to me with an acoustic guitar .’”

(Watch Anastasio perform “Farmhouse” at Iron City in 2018 in the video below.)

Rolling Stone ranked Anastasio number 53 on its list of the “250 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.”

“It’s one thing to influence other guitarists, but Trey Anastasio’s immersive approach to the instrument has proven to be nothing less than a cultural beacon,” said Rolling Stone. “Anastasio and his Phish bandmates, much like the Grateful Dead before them, have created a tribe of obsessed fans who follow the band from show to show and vigorously debate the merits of official and fake live recordings. And while psychedelic recreation is certainly part of the Phish ritual, it is Anastasio’s preternatural ability to keep his slippery and cunning modal improvisations fresh, dynamic and almost telepathically connected to his bandmates that guides fans through their musical journey. It’s no wonder everyone from Dave Matthews to the New York Philharmonic is eager to work with the guitarist when Phish goes on hiatus.”