Welcome to the house of fun!: 05 August 2007

Garth Brooks was born February 7, 1962 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the youngest of six children in Yukon, Oklahoma. His father Troyal Brooks worked as a draughtsman for an oil company, while his mother Colleen Carroll was a country music singer on the Capitol Records label in the 1950s and also a regular on the Red Foley Show.

Brooks began his professional music career, singing and playing guitar in Oklahoma clubs and bars, particularly the Tumbleweed in Stillwater. After a failed 1985 24-hour trip to Nashville to gain a record contract, Brooks returned to Oklahoma and in 1986, married Sandy Mahl of Owasso, Oklahoma, whom he had met while working as a bouncer. The following year, the couple moved to Nashville, and Brooks was able to begin making contacts in the music industry

While struggling to be noticed by industry executives, Brooks frequently recorded demo records for songwriter Kent Blazy. Blazy introduced Brooks to Trisha Yearwood, another aspiring country singer, in October 1987. The pair became friends and pledged to help each other in their careers. Brooks achieved success first, signing a recording contract with Capitol Records in 1988. Keeping his promise, in 1991, he invited Yearwood to be the opening act on his tour.

Garth Brooks' eponymous first album, Garth Brooks, was released in 1989 and was a critical and chart success. It peaked at #2 in the US country album chart and reached #13 on the Billboard 200 pop album chart. Most of the album was traditionalist country, influenced in part by George Strait. His follow-up album No Fences, was released in 1990 and spent 23 weeks as #1 on the Billboard country music chart. The album also reached #3 on the pop chart, and eventually become Brooks's highest-selling album, with domestic sales of over 16 million records

While Brooks' musical style placed him squarely within the boundaries of country music, he was strongly influenced by the 1970s singer-songwriter movement, especially the works of James Taylor. In his highly successful live shows, Brooks used a wireless headset microphone to free himself to run about the stage, adding energy and arena rock theatrics to spice up the normally staid country music approach to concerts

Brooks' third album, Ropin' the Wind, released in September 1991, had advance orders of 4 million copies and entered the pop album charts at #1, a first for a country act. The Chase was Brooks's fifth album, and in October 1992 all five of the albums were listed on Billboard's pop top 50 albums chart, a first for any artist in the modern pop era.

Brooks won his first Grammy Award for Best Male Country Vocal Performance in 1992 for the

album Ropin' the Wind. He was awarded the Academy of Country Music award for Entertainer of the Year for 1990, 1991, 1992 and 1993, and the award for Top Male Vocalist for 1990 and 1991.

One of the later peaks in Brooks' fame came on August 7, 1997, when he gave a free concert in New York City's Central Park, drawing hundreds of thousands of people in a city that many would say is far removed from the country music world. Estimates of the actual crowd size varied considerably, from 250,000 to 750,000 or even higher, primarily because many people were enjoying the show from outside the full-to-capacity venue. Brooks himself has estimated the crowd at close to 900,000. An additional 14.6 million viewers watched the performance live on HBO. Billy Joel and Don McLean made guest appearances.

After showing that he still had the ability to draw such a large crowd, it was not surprising that Brooks won the award for the ACM Entertainer of the Year in 1998. The following year the Recording Industry Association of America announced that Garth Brooks was the second best-selling solo artist of the 20th century in America, after Elvis Presley.

As his career flourished, Brooks seemed frustrated by the conflicts between career and family. He talked of retiring from performing in 1992 and 1995, but each time returned to touring. In 1999, Brooks and his wife separated, announcing their plans to divorce on October 9, 2000.
Two weeks later, on October 26, 2000, Brooks officially announced his retirement from recording and performing. Later that evening, Capitol Records saluted his achievement of selling 100 million albums in the US with a lavish party at Nashville's Gaylord Entertainment Center.

Brooks's final album, Scarecrow was released November 13, 2001. The album eached #1 on both the pop and country charts. Although he staged a few performances for promotional purposes, Brooks stated that he would be retired from recording and performing at least until his youngest daughter, Allie, turned 18.

In the mid-1990s, many tabloids reported throughout the decade that he was actually having an affair with longtime friend and collaborator Trisha Yearwood. The two have continually denied having had an affair. Following Brooks's divorce, however, the pair did begin dating, and the couple wed on December 10, 2005, at their home in Oklahoma, marking the second marriage for Brooks and the third for Yearwood.

In early 2006 Wal-Mart issued The Lost Sessions as a single CD apart from the boxed set, with extra tracks including a top 40 duet with Yearwood, "Love Will Always Win". The couple were later nominated for a "Best Country Collaboration With Vocals" Grammy Award for the song.

On November 1, 2006, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. announced that Garth Brooks made history as the company's top selling music artist of all time. With nearly 20 million discs sold at Wal-Mart in the first year of his exclusive relationship with the retailer, Brooks has been able to transcend his retirement and continue his history-making performances.

Brooks proclaims that his job as a father is a lot harder than touring. In a CMT Garth Brooks concert special he also remarked "I love what I'm doing, but I miss what I did." In virtually every interview he has done in 2006, Brooks has talked about whether he's going to stage another tour, often saying "if the door opens up" he would have a tour that is better than anything he's ever done.

Aint Goin Down (Til the Sun Comes Up)