Eric Church will embark on an arena tour in the fall, making him one of the first artists to return to a full concert circuit since the COVID-19 pandemic brought touring to a halt in March 2020.

Church’s appropriately named The Gather Again Tour kicks off Sept. 17 at Rupp Arena in Lexington, Ky., and will stop in 55 cities through North America before ending at New York’s Madison Square Garden on May 20, 2022.

Tickets for the U.S. dates, booked by WME and promoted by Messina Touring Group, go on sale May 4 to members of Church’s fan club, the Church Choir, and to the general public on May 7. The Canadian dates will go on sale soon. The arenas will be sold at 100% capacity with seating in the round.

Church has been working toward getting back on the road since shortly after the pandemic started and hinted that he would announce the tour soon in his Billboard April 3 cover story, out now. “All I’ve ever done is play live shows. That’s my whole gig,” he said.

An elated Church dropped the news first, per his habit, to his Church Choir members via video, then to Billboard.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMWQsg9zIUg

The reigning CMA entertainer of the year has been off the road since his 2019 Double Down arena tour, Billboard’s highest-grossing country outing of 2019. The outing’s final night drew 56,521 people to Nashville’s Nissan Stadium, breaking Taylor Swift’s attendance record there.

After the pandemic caused him to push back both his Heart & Soul triple-album project and a tour from 2020, Church met with epidemiologists, venue managers and industry vets within his own circle, determined to figure out how to get back onstage safely. “It became very clear to me that the only way to really get back to normal is through vaccinations,” he says. “You’ve got to get needles in arms.”

Church can’t wait to get onstage and share the connection with his audience. “Honestly, there's a spirit moving around. I would even say the best shows is me 20 [percent]; them, 80. It's them giving. All I'm doing is starting the process and then they just carry it,” he told Billboard.