First BST 2026 headliner announced as American music legend facing rape lawsuit

British Summer Time (BST) 2025 may have just ended, but we already have our first headliner for next year.

American Country musician Garth Brooks, 63, has been confirmed to play the 2026 festival, marking his first UK show in almost 30 years.

He will take to the stage in London’s Hyde Park on June 27 next year, having last played in the country in 1998.

The Oklahoma-born performer has sold more than 170million records globally, and he’s second only to The Beatles for record sales in the US.

His second album, No Fences (1991), was the first country album to go multi-platinum, with the follow-up, Ropin’ The Wind (1991), becoming the first country album to top the US pop charts.

However, his commercial success across the pond has been limited, as he’s achieved three UK top 40 singles and two UK top 10 albums.

Jim King, chief executive of the festival’s operators AEG Presents UK and European Festivals, said that announcing Brooks as the first BST 2026 performer is ‘a landmark moment’.

‘He joins the line of legendary artists who have defined BST over the years.’

King describes the Ain’t Goin’ Down (‘Til the Sun Comes Up) hitmaker as ‘a true global icon’, with his tunes ‘connecting with audiences everywhere’ since his career launched in the 80s.

‘His influence has paved the way for many of the country stars we celebrate today,’ added King. ‘His first UK performance in nearly three decades promises to be an unforgettable occasion at Hyde Park.’

The 2025 series of BST concerts saw performances from the likes of funk legend Stevie Wonder, pop star Sabrina Carpenter, rocker Neil Young, and pop-rock star Olivia Rodrigo.

Jeff Lynne’s Electric Light Orchestra (ELO) were due to play their final concert at this year’s event, but singer Lynne was forced to cancel the concert in July due to illness.

Tickets for the Brooks gig will go on sale on September 18, at 10am from the BST website, with further announcements for support and the other headliners for the 2026 edition of BST expected in due course.

Brooks certainly won’t be the first country artist to play at BST, which has previously hosted the likes of Morgan Wallen and Zach Bryan.

But his upcoming summer gig set follows a major controversy in his career, as the Friends in Low Places vocalist was accused of rape last year.

In October, a former employee claimed that Brooks had raped her in a hotel room in 2019 and subjected her to unwanted sexual conduct. This allegedly included exposing himself on several occasions and ‘groping her breasts’.

The woman claimed the trauma from the alleged sexual assault became ‘so unbearable’ that she became suicidal.

She further claimed in her filing that she was forced to keep working for Brooks because of her financial hardship, which he was aware of and allegedly exploited.

Brooks has denied the accusations made against him, arguing that he had been ‘hassled to no end with threats and lies’. Last December, he filed to dismiss the rape suit.

Requesting that the case be thrown out, Brooks had argued that the lawsuit filed in the Los Angeles Superior Court was a ‘duplicative’ of a defamation lawsuit he filed against his accuser in Mississippi in September.

But the motion was denied, while the accuser’s lawyer remains ‘confident that Brooks will be held accountable for his actions and his efforts to silence [their] client’.

Two-time Grammy winner Brooks previously described the Californian lawsuit as an attempt at extortion for ‘millions of dollars’ and likened it to ‘having a loaded gun waved in [his] face’.

‘Hush money, no matter how much or how little, is still hush money,’ he said.

‘In my mind, that means I am admitting to behaviour I am incapable of—ugly acts no human should ever do to another.’

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