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Luke Combs said the Concert for Carolina benefit show “will undoubtedly go down as the night I am most proud of in my career.”
The North Carolina-born country star organized the massive fundraising event with Eric Church, who also grew up in the state and lives there for a portion of the year. The star-studded concert quickly sold out. Altogether, more than 80,000 attendees packed Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina, raising more than $24.5 million to help the region impacted by Hurricane Helene.
“My goodness, what a night! This will undoubtedly go down as the night I am most proud of in my career,” Combs wrote in a caption on Instagram on Sunday (October 27). “Being able to give back to the place that gave me so much. There are so many people to thank for helping making this night possible on such short notice. My team, band and crew worked so hard to pull this off and I seriously can’t thank them enough. The Panthers front office team, The Tepper family, AEG, SES, Livenation, the venue staff, all the sponsors, the state of North Carolina, all the performers and their teams for donating their time and resources to this effort. The list is long and if I missed anyone I apologize but you know who you are. We were able to raise 24.5 MILLION DOLLARS for the people of Western North Carolina and I’m so thankful and humbled to be able to be a part of that. There were countless friends, family, and neighbors there and you could truly feel the love in that stadium last night.”
Other artists who joined the lineup include fellow headliners James Taylor and Billy Strings, in addition to Sheryl Crow, Keith Urban, Bailey Zimmerman, The Avett Brothers, Scotty McCreery, Chase Rice and Parmalee. There were also special appearances by Nicole Kidman, Randy Travis and his wife, and more. It was all hosted by Caleb Pressley and Marty Smith, and live streamed on Veeps and iHeartRadio.
“Everyone has come together and made this such a special, special night, and I just can’t wait to step out on the stage tonight and do what I do best, and see him [Eric] do what he does best, and a lot of other great artists do everything that they know how to do to raise a lot of money for a lot of great causes,” Combs said during a press conference on Saturday morning, hours before the benefit show. He added later, “show like this usually takes a year, or a year and a half, to plan, and we were able to get it done in three weeks. ...We’re thankful for tonight.”