Way back in September of 2019, Anne and Steve Stodghill hosted a party for about 100 guests in the backyard of their sprawling estate in Preston Hollow. The occasion was to announce that a special fundraising concert called All for the Hall, benefiting the education programs of Nashville’s Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, would be coming to Dallas for the first time. The highlight of the event was to be a concert by C&W superstars Brooks and Dunn for just 400 people on April 29, 2020, at The Statler Dallas.
Then the pesky pandemic came along, and the April 2020 shebang had to be put on hold.
Tonight, though, in a scene straight out of Groundhog Day, many of those guests reassembled in the Stodghills’ backyard, and the All for the Hall Dallas event, presented by Winston and Strawn LLP, where Steve practices law, was “relaunched” with the same players and rescheduled with a new date: Wednesday, September 22, 2021.
Brooks and Dunn had told the organizers, “We’re in, whenever you all reschedule,” Steve confided to the crowd, which included Regina Montoya and Paul Coggins, Harry Hunsicker, Tiffany and Paul Divis, Kim and Greg Hext, Samantha and Phil Wortley, Wendy and Boyd Messmann, Laura and Dennis Moon, Lisa and Joe Bob Shirley, Holly and Stubbs Davis with daughter Landry Davis, Texas Music Office Director Brendon Anthony, and famed country singer-songwriter Aaron Watson with his manager, Gino Genaro.
Looking like a “Brand New Man“—he’s shed a whopping 115 pounds in recent months—Stodg added that country star Trisha Yearwood (aka Mrs. Garth Brooks) would be appearing on Tuesday, September 21, the night before the Statler concert, at a patron party. Also taking the mic tonight was Kurt Johnson, board chair of the Country Music Association; Lisa Purcell of the Hall of Fame and Museum; and Texas-born Aaron, who performed a set of songs after the talking was over.
The All for the Hall concerts, the brainchild of Country Music Hall of Fame member Vince Gill, are typically held in New York, Los Angeles or Nashville. Some of the funds raised here may be earmarked for local educational initiatives like the Dallas Independent School District’s Words and Music program. All for the Hall Dallas is being chaired by Anne and Steve, along with co-chairs Katy and Lawrence Bock, Terri and Kurt Johnson, Jonika and Corky Nix and Sunie and Steve Solomon.
For more looks at the C&W folks on hand for Aaron and the big reveal, check out MySweetCharity Photo Gallery.