Please Note: This performance is presented as part of the 2026 Big Ears Festival. Festival pass purchasers receive early access to tickets and preferred pricing. Tickets for this special performance may be offered to the public pending availability. Visit BigEarsFestival.org for more details.
The list of songwriters who have changed the shape of rock and pop music as much as David Byrne is so short it barely exists. A founding member of the Talking Heads and a pioneer of using sampling to build uncanny worlds of rhythm and melody alongside Brian Eno, Byrne has long existed in the gap between the experimental and the accessible, the familiar and the alien, serving as an ever-flexible bridge between worlds that might have seemed distant. With Talking Heads, he fused Afrobeat and post-punk, morphing ideas of what constituted the New Wave with existential lyrics that invested the absurd with deep meaning. But he has not sat still, either: In his 50-year career, the art-pop architect has helped turn his albums into Broadway shows, flirted with ascendant folk-rock anthems, and forged multimedia presentations that tested the bounds of what we think of when we think of concerts. His performances feel like jubilees.
Byrne’s enthusiasm for artistic evolution remains abundant on his 2025 album, Who Is the Sky? After hearing the New York ensemble Ghost Train Orchestra interpret the works of enigmatic street composer and poet Moondog alongside Kronos Quartet, Byrne wondered if they might make a suitable backing band for his new songs. Humorous and wise, with seven decades of experience fueling songs about ideas he finds silly and others he finds sacred, Who Is the Sky? celebrates solidarity over sweeping strings and triumphant horns and a commanding sense of rhythmic curiosity, an anchor of Byrne’s work since the start. A clear musical, spiritual, and ideological inspiration to so many artists who have performed at Big Ears during the past 15 years, Byrne—who visited Knoxville in 2023 to speak and curate films—finally plays the festival itself.
Tickets On-Sale Friday, December 5, 2025, at 10 AM.
NO Elevator access to the Balcony Level in the Auditorium.
Doors open 1 hour before show time.
Tickets can be purchased in person at the KCAC Box Office (Thursday and Friday 10am to 3pm) or through Ticketmaster. Tickets are available through Ticketmaster.com or by the Ticketmaster app. Tickets are subject to additional service charges.
Additional Information:
Walk-through metal detectors are now in place and operational at all entrances. Please allow extra time to enter the building. Be prepared to remove all items such as cell phones and keys from your pockets before passing through the metal detectors. We encourage you to bring only necessary items with you in order to reduce your time entering the building.