Rockford-native country music artist Mo Pitney will be returning from Nashville to his home state to perform at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday at the Varsity Center in Carbondale.

The 24-year-old country musician grew up watching his dad play steel guitar and listening to bluegrass records, and he said he knew at a very young age that the music industry was for him.

“Every young kid starts off wanting to be like his dad,” Pitney said in an email.

Pitney’s first record “Country” came out in 2015, an album he said was influenced by his childhood and Nashville, where he moved at 18 years old in 2011 to break into the music world.  

The music-centric city of Nashville helped him master songwriting, Pitney said.

“Once I started writing, playing music for a career seemed more achievable,” he said.

Pitney said he tries to keep his style classically country in an era when the genre has become heavily influenced by dance and pop rhythms.

His show at the Varsity Center comes at the end of a European music tour in which Pitney traveled all over the United Kingdom. 

For more information about tickets for Pitney’s show, contact the Varsity Center at 618-457-5353.

Staff writer Amelia Blakely can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @AmeilaBlakely.

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