EASTON, Pa. — A country music artist with nine gold and platinum albums who once set a ticket-price record while selling out Bethlehem’s Musikfest festival will play Easton's State Theatre.
So will the lead singer and guitarist from a multiplatinum group that had hits from the 1960s into the 1980s and is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Martina McBride, who sold out Musikfest with record-priced tickets in 2010 with hits such as “Independence Day,” “My Baby Loves Me,” “Wild Angels” and “This One’s For the Girls,” will play at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 26.
And Justin Hayward, who led The Moody Blues for more than 50 years and who sang the hits “Nights In White Satin,” “Tuesday Afternoon,” “Just a Player (In a Rock ‘n’ Roll Band)” and “In Your Wildest Dreams,” will perform at 7 p.m. Sept. 14.
Tickets for all the shows go on sale to the public at 10 a.m. Friday, May, at the State Theatre website or the box office at 453 Northampton St., Easton.State Theatre
The two were among four new shows announced for the State Theatre's 100th season.
Also announced for upcoming shows were
Magical Mystery Doors, a tribute to The Beatles, Led Zeppelin and The Doors, at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 13.
Also, Who the Hell Are These Guys, a comedy show featuring "four of the sharpest rising stand-ups in the business," at 8 p.m. Sept. 12.
Tickets for all the shows are $90-$160 for McBride, $54.73–$105 for Hayward, $44.23–$59.98 for Who the Hell are These Guys and $38.98–$70 for Magical Mystery Doors.
They go on sale to the public at 10 a.m. Friday, May 8, at the State Theatre website, or the box office at 453 Northampton St., Easton.
Martina McBride
McBride, 59, has sold more than 16 million copies of her albums and has had 31 Top 25 Country chart hit singles — five of which went to No. 1 and six of which sold gold or platinum.
Her hits also include the No. 1s “A Broken Wing,” “Wrong Again,” “I Love You” and “Blessed.” Her last Top 10 Country hit was “I’m Gonna Love You Through It” in 2011.
She released her debut disc in 1992 and since has put out 14 albums of new material, 11 compilation discs and a live album.
Nine of the discs have gone gold or platinum, with 1997's "Evolution" going triple platinum and her 2001 Greatest Hits album selling four times platinum.
McBride has won the Country Music Association’s Female Vocalist of the Year award four times — tying Reba McEntire for third most — and the Academy of Country Music’s Top Female Vocalist award three times.
She's also a 14-time Grammy Award nominee, including nine for Best Female Country Vocal Performance.
In addition to her 2010 show at Musikfest, McBride also played a sold-out show there in 2003 and played at Allentown Fair in 2000 in a late replacement for LeAnn Rimes.
She last played the Lehigh Valley at Performed at Sands Bethlehem Event Center, now called Wind Creek Event Center, in 2018.
Justin Hayward
Hayward's show will be part of his "The Story in your Eyes Tour," and with a full band he will play Moody Blues hits and solo favorites, "all woven together with personal stories and intimate moments."
The show also will include a live question-and-answer period.
Hayward with The Moody Blues had a dozen Top 30 hits and 16 albums that went gold or platinum, including 1967's “Day of Future Past,” which is considered seminal to the prog-rock genre.
The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2018 for “over 50 years of exhilarating and significant music that has influenced countless musicians and rocked fans around the world.”
In addition to performing with The Moody Blues, Hayward has released eight solo albums, including “Songwriter,” “Night Flight,” “Moving Mountains” and 2013’s “Spirits of the Western Sky.”
His most recent solo disc was the 2020 EP "One Summer Day/My Juliette."
Hayward played a show with singer Christopher Cross at Wind Creek Event Center in 2024. He also played Musikfest Cafe at ArtsQuest Center at SteelStacks in 2017 and also played there in 2015.
The Moody Blues also headlined Musikfest in 2014.
