Luke Combs, Carrie Underwood Make Billboard’s Highest Paid For 2019
Billboard ranked the highest-paid musicians of 2019 and eight of them are country artists. Billboard ranked the earnings of the top 40 music acts based on 2019 U.S. concert grosses and recording royalties generated in the same period from domestic sales, streaming and publishing.
Country music’s biggest earners in 2019:
- Eric Church ranked at #11 making 25.85 million and over $22 million in total earnings from live dates on his extensive Double Down tour.
- George Strait ranked at #17 with 21.3 million thanks to a boost from his Honky Tonk Time Machine album, his catalog generated over 1 billion streams in the United States, and his artist and publishing royalties hit nearly $3.5 million, or roughly 16% of his income for the year.
- Florida Georgia Line ranked at #21 with 20.89 million, who generated nearly 20% of its revenue from its recorded-music catalog, amassing an impressive 2.1 billion combined streams. The numbers were boosted by the country duo’s pop crossover hit, “Meant To Be,” with Bebe Rexha.
- Carrie Underwood came in at #30 earning 17.5 million cracking 1 billion streams, which earned her nearly $1.4 million. But it was her “Cry Pretty 360” tour, that resulted in a $15 million payday — 87% of her revenue.
- Zac Brown Band ranked #33 with 17.1 million in earning 14 million on the road.
- Luke Combs had an incredible year ranking #34 on the list, making 17.05 million thanks in part to the November 2019 release of Combs’ latest album, What You See Is What You Get; he closed out the year with the best streaming numbers of the genre: 3.2 billion overall streams. As a result, he earned over $6 million in recorded-music royalties, nearly 40% of his earnings.
- Thomas Rhett came in at #35 on the list scored 16.07 million in 2019 with the release of his Center Point Road album which helped him crack 2 billion streams, which amounted to $2.6 million in royalties. All told, his recorded music generated just over 21% of his take-home pay.
- Jason Aldean ranked #37 with 16.3 million earned in 2019, with $12.6 million coming from touring.
Nancy Brooks has been working in the country music industry for almost 30 years. She has interviewed pretty much any country star you can think of. In the late 1990s, she started working with Dolly Parton. And yes, Nancy reports that Parton is as sweet as you would think. She loves her life in country music and has been backstage at every CMA Awards show since the late 1990s.
Many of her stories are from her one-on-one interviews. She was there at the beginning of the incredible careers of many music superstars today, including Taylor Swift, Shania Twain, and Blake Shelton, and has interviewed them multiple times throughout the years.
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