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Merle Haggard coming to Springfield

The country legend will perform at Kuss Auditorium in April

The one, the only, Merle Haggard will play Kuss Auditorium in the spring.

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By Andrew McGinn, Staff Writer 9:25 AM Friday, December 2, 2011

SPRINGFIELD — What kind of world do we live in when a new Merle Haggard record doesn’t even make the country chart?

It was a rhetorical question, really.

We’ve all known for a long time.

But it’s just been announced that Haggard will be coming to Springfield on April 22 for a 7 p.m. show at Kuss Auditorium — by God, if you so much as think you like country music, make the world a better place and buy a ticket.

Tickets, priced from $20 (students) to $59, will go on sale in person at 10 a.m. Wednesday at the Clark State Performing Arts Center, then online at pac.clarkstate.edu at noon.

Call (937) 328-3874 for more information.

Clark County’s own Wyatt McCubbin will open the show.

At 74, Hag is still writing and singing like he has since 1965 — he released the album “Working in Tennessee” this fall.

It made No. 155 on the Billboard 200 chart, and never bothered showing up at all on the country chart.

Regardless, Haggard arguably is the greatest living country artist.

The list of his classics — 38 No. 1 hits in all — is simply staggering, and includes “Mama Tried,” “Sing Me Back Home,” “The Bottle Let Me Down,” “White Line Fever,” “Okie From Muskogee,” “The Fightin’ Side of Me” and “Big City.”

A country hall of famer and a 2010 Kennedy Center honoree, it’s just not every day that someone this legendary rolls into Springfield.

Contact this reporter at amcginn@coxohio.com.

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