In 1980, when Shaun Cassidy sold 50,000 seats at the Houston Astrodome, he couldn’t know that he would be embarking on the longest tour of his career 45 years later.
On Sept. 13, the former pop idol and actor will kick off the 50-city The Road to US outing at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville.
“The truth is, in my whole career I never really toured — because as a kid, I was working on The Hardy Boys, [TV show] so I’d go out on weekends, and then I got a week here or two weeks there in the summer,” Cassidy tells Billboard. “But this tour that I’m starting will be the biggest commitment of 50 shows and more to come I’ve ever had in my life.”
Cassidy, following in the entertainment footsteps of his half-brother, David Cassidy, and parents, Oscar-winning actress Shirley Jones and Tony-winning actor Jack Cassidy, burst onto the pop scene in 1976 with “That’s Rock ‘n Roll.” The breakthrough hit reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was followed by his chart-topping cover of The Crystals’ “Da Doo Ron Ron,” and “Hey Deanie,” which reached No. 7.
Cassidy released five studio albums between 1977 and 1980 on Curb/Warner Bros. including the Todd Rundgren-produced Wasp. Simultaneously, he also was acting on The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries, which ran from 1977-1979. Cassidy then focused on the stage, appearing in plays on Broadway and London’s West End during the ‘80s and early ’90, before segueing into behind-the-scenes TV work in the mid-‘90s.
Since then, he has had an extremely successful second career creating, writing and and/or producing such acclaimed television series as American Gothic, Cold Case, Cover Me, The Agency and, most recently, New Amsterdam.
He has also toured sporadically since 2020 as a one-man show that expanded to a full band, ending with five sold-out nights at 54 Below in New York City in 2023. But those outings were not as extensive as the forthcoming one, which he almost felt called to do.
“Honestly, the reason I’m really motivated to do this is I have such a feeling that if you are in a position in any way to be a catalyst for bringing people together in a room or a concert hall or a church or your kitchen table, in any context, gathering people, getting them to put down their phone for a minute and actually look at each other and connect and have a shared experience is just so important at this at this stage in our world, I think,” he says.
The new show is a tribute to music, his family and his fans. “It’s really a love letter to our shared history and experience,” he says. “I feel the disconnection and the sadness tied to the disconnection so profoundly, especially with younger people who didn’t grow up without social media, and the mislead of social media that it will somehow connect you further, when the opposite is proven to be true.”
Cassidy isn’t going so far as to declare his shows a no-phone zone, but he does ask fans to put their phones down — “because I want to see their faces,” he says.
Though he hasn’t released an album since 1980, the concerts will include new songs. “That’s the wonderful gift of performing again,” he says. “It inspired me to start writing songs, which I hadn’t been doing for decades while I’ve been writing hundreds of television scripts.”
The songs he’ll debut were written specifically for the show. “They are songs that underscore a story I might be telling about me or my family or about the audience, or about an experience I had back in the day or am having now,” he says, adding he’s written about 20 new songs.
Cassidy hasn’t recorded any of the songs for release and admits he is not thinking about that. “I guess I could sell new songs like t-shirts on my website or something, but, honestly, I’m so far away from how the music business works now,” he says. “My [old] songs are on Spotify, and I get five cents every month or whatever, but if I did it, it would really just be for me and for any fan that wants a new song. Maybe I will.”
He does add that Rundgren came to one of his shows in 2023 “and actually Todd and I talked about working together again — at that show anyway. But I haven’t followed up because I’ve been too busy with TV stuff. But who knows?”
The tour, which was booked by UTA, will allow Cassidy and his band a little sightseeing in between gigs. He plans to play around 12 shows a month and in-between will take advantage of the highlights of whatever region he’s in. “We’ll do four shows and take three days off, hike the Appalachian Trail, visit Washington, D.C., do whatever touristy things we want to do,” he says. He also needs to leave time to continue work on a number of television projects he has in development.
Between geographic segments of the tour, he will then come back home to his wife and four children in Santa Barbara, Calif., and tend to the wine they produce, My First Crush, which donates a portion of its proceeds to No Kid Hungry, which feeds hungry children nationwide.
“I’ll need to take a break,” he says. “One of the benefits of not having toured or sung other than around my own home piano for years and years is my voice is stronger than it was when I was 20 because I never tore it up. And I don’t want to tear it up now.”
Also, because he has played live so infrequently, he hasn’t burnt out on playing his hits thousands of times. “They’re fresh. I go out and I’m singing ‘Da Doo Ron Ron’ with more passion than I ever sang it when I was 17,” he says. “I know there’s a lot of performers that have resentment about these songs that made them successful, and I guess if you’ve sung the song 10,000 times, you might get sick of it. I don’t have that experience at all. I can’t wait to sing these songs.”
He’s also appreciative that this time he’s not singing over thousands of shrieking fans. “My early shows were just scream-a-thons, I couldn’t talk to anybody,” he says. “Now I actually can engage with people and look them in the eye and see that they’ve had a life, and I’ve had a life, and I’m just so grateful to share it.”
The Road to US tour dates (more to come):
9/13 Nashville/Grand Ole Opry
9/17 Waterville ME/Waterville Opera House
9/19 Beverly MA/ Cabot Theater
9/25 Glenside PA/The Keswick
9/26 Seneca NY/Niagara Falls – The Bear’s Den
9/27 Seneca NY/Niagara Falls – The Bear’s Den
9/28 Verona NY/Turning Stone Resort Casino
10/16 Hopewell, VA/The Beacon
10/17 Alexandria, VA/The Birchmere
10/18 Annapolis, MD/Ram’s Head
10/19 Rocky Mount VA/The Harvester
10/23 Peekskill NY/Paramount Hudson Valley Arts
10/24 Newton NJ/The Newton Theater
10/25 Norfolk CT/Infinity Hall
10/26 Bethlehem PA/Art’s Quest
11/5 Milwaukee WI/The Pabst Theater
11/7 Des Plaines IL/The Des Plaines Theatre
11/8 St. Charles IL/The Arcada
11/9 Burnsville MN/Ames Center
11/11 Shipshewana IN/The Blue Gate
11/13 Nashville IN/Brown County Music Center
11/14 Cincinnati OH/Ludlow’s
11/15 Columbus OH/The Southern
11/16 Akron OH/The Goodyear Theater
12/4 Detroit MI/The Fisher Theater
12/5 Warren OH/Robin’s Theater
12/6 Munhall PA/Carnegie Hall Library
12/11 Orlando FL/The Plaza Live
12/12 Clearwater FL/Capitol Theater
12/13 Ponte Vedra FL/Ponte Vedra Concert Hall
1/8 Austin TX/Paramount Theater
1/9 Dallas TX/The Granada Theater
1/10 Houston TX/House of Blues
1/16 Napa CA/Uptown Theater
1/17 Riverside CA/The Fox
1/18 El Cajon CA/Magnolia