Country music star Kenny Chesney is kicking off his 2006 The Road and The Radio tour in Ohio in late March. From the Midwest he will travel south to be in Austin at the Frank Erwin Center on March 31. Chesney’s going to be bringing a few friends along with him, too - Dierks Bentley and Sugarland.

Chesney’s 2005 Somewhere In The Sun tour was wildly successful – selling more tickets the first half of the year than anyone else, save for U2. He was easily the biggest country show on the road. After a few months off the road and some time in the studio, Chesney says he can’t wait to get back to the stage.

“What can I say?” he says with a laugh. “Even when I’ve just been several hundred thousand miles and am worn out exhausted, the place where I’m the most alive is on that stage. I gotta tell you, the time off has really given me an edge to charge my batteries, think about why we do it and get as hungry for it as when we were first getting started.”

The Road and The Radio tour will be even bigger and brighter than Chesney’s last tour. The stage will be bigger - allowing Chesney and his band to take full advantage of the performance space, and the standing area that fits into the stage configuration will be returning. As far as the tour being brighter, there will definitely be more lights. If this gives you any idea how big this show is going to be – his last tour was done with 18 semis.

While Chesney is riding the wave of his popularity and success, he has also been making efforts to help young people achieve their dreams and succeed as well. Before he debuted his newest album, Chesney partnered with the JCPenny Afterschool Fund, a non-profit organization dedicated to making local after school programs available to families who need them. On November 8, The Road and The Radio went on sale at JCPenny stores across the country. For every CD sold, JCPenny donated all of its net profits from it to the JCPenny Afterschool Fund.

Warming up the stage for Chesney will be Horizon Award-winning songwriter Dierks Bentley. This will be Bentley’s second performance at the Frank Erwin Center (the first time he came here, he opened for George Strait). Also along for the ride is breakout trio Sugarland, who are on their third big hit with “Just Might Make Me Believe.”

Bentley makes no bones about who his country music influences are, and he couldn’t have chosen better than Merle Haggard and Waylon Jennings. Their influences were apparent on his 2003 self-titled debut album and on his 2005 follow-up, Modern Day Drifter.

Sugarland hails from Atlanta, Georgia. Kristen Hall recently left the group to spend more time at home writing songs, but lead singer Jennifer Nettles and Kristian Bush will continue as a group. Nettles grew up on Southern gospel and has a pronounced twang, while Bush grew up on The Replacements but came out a folk singer and songwriter.

This lineup is sure to be a great show. Chesney, Bentley and Sugarland are big names in country music, so seats may be scarce!