THE BEST OF MANCHESTER
The UK leg includes a date at Manchester Arena.
The singer shot to fame in 2015 with her debut single Be The One, and has continued to reach the top of the UK singles charts with tracks New Rules, IDGAF, One Kiss and Electricity.
The lead single from the new album, Don’t Start Now, has already been streamed more than 170 million times and has been performed at the EMAs, AMAs and ARIAs.
Whitesnake and Foreigner Manchester Arena, June 8
Rock ‘n’ roll titans Whitesnake and Foreigner are joining forces for a UK tour next year.
Fans can look forward to an arsenal of hits spanning four decades from the two groups.
Founded in 1978 by Deep Purple singer David Coverdale, Whitesnake’s hits include Here I Go Again On My Own, Still of the Night and Is This Love?
The band will be performing classics like these from their expansive back catalogue as well as songs from their 13th studio album Flesh & Blood, released in 2019.
Foreigner are also responsible for some of rock ‘n’ roll’s most enduring anthems including Cold As Ice and I Want to Know What Love Is.
Liam Gallagher
Heaton Park, June 12
Liam Gallagher will perform a massive homecoming show at Heaton Park on the eve of Parklife.
The former Oasis star will perform on what will be used as the festival’s main stage, in the same slot headlined by his brother Noel Gallagher in 2019.
Liam will be back on familiar turf, having headlined Parklife in 2018. Heaton Park was also the scene of Oasis’ last-ever hometown shows in June 2009, shortly before their acrimonious split.
The band played three nights in the park, the first of which saw them promise full refunds to 70,000 fans after power cuts caused the sound to go out for nearly an hour. It cost them a reported £1m in cheques issued from the ‘Bank of Burnage’.
Sharing the news, Liam promised songs from his two solo albums as well as some ‘stone-cold Oasis classics’.
Parklife
Heaton Park, June 13 and 14 Manchester’s biggest festival returns to Heaton Park, with US rapper Tyler the Creator headlining.
The provocative artist will top the bill on the Saturday night.
Along with a show the same weekend at London’s Lovebox, it will be his first festival appearances in the UK since he was banned from entering the country to perform at Reading and Leeds in 2015.
Theresa May, then Home Secretary, deemed him ‘a threat to public order’ and claimed his lyrics encouraged ‘violence and intolerance of homosexuality’.
In a recent interview with the Guardian, Tyler - whose latest Grammy-nominated album Igor tells the story of a love affair with a man denied there was ever any homophobic intent behind his music and said he had been ‘treated like a terrorist’.
He returned to the country earlier this year to play a string of shows at Brixton Academy in London.
The Parklife line up will be revealed in full next week.
Thom Yorke
O2 Victoria Warehouse, June 20 and 21
Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke is playing a limited run of UK shows with Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes, the touring entity named after his second solo album.
Comprised of Yorke, Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich and visual artist, Tarik Barri, the trio will bring to life songs from across Yorke’s career, including latest album, Anima.
Sounds of the City Castlefield Bowl, July 1 to 11 Sounds of the City has established itself as an integral part of Manchester’s summer music season, with headliners last summer including Kylie Minogue, Bloc Party and Elbow.
This year it will be back with another massive line up across eight days in July.
Foals will open the summer series on Wednesday July 1, supported by Manchester locals and close friends of the band, Everything Everything.
Next up will be Crowded House on Thursday July 2, with their first headline date in Manchester for more than a decade.
Hitting the stage on Friday, July 3 will be Kaiser Chiefs, supported by fellow noughties indie giants Razorlight.
Sounds of the City regulars Paul Heaton and Jacqui Abbott return for another sold-out show on Saturday, July 4.
Scottish singer-songwriter and social media hero Lewis Capaldi will return to Manchester on Wednesday, July 8, after two shows at the O2 Apollo in March.
Sydney’s DMA’s, who’ve been dubbed the Australian Oasis, will tear up the stage on Thursday, July 9, with support coming from The Blinders and The Lathums.
The Streets will take over on Friday, July 10, with special guests yet to be announced, before Hacienda Classical closes the show on Saturday, July 11 with its now annual rave-meets-recital show.
Aerosmith
Manchester Arena, July 18
Rock legends Aerosmith will play a huge Manchester Arena show on their European tour for 2020.
Fresh from their Las Vegas residency, the tour will coincide with the band’s 50th anniversary, and celebrate a career that has seen them win four Grammy awards.
Steven Tyler and his bandmates Joe Perry, Brad Whitford, Tom Hamilton and Joey Kramer will perform at the Manchester Arena as one of only two UK dates, with another in London.
The group formed in Boston in 1970 and have racked up a whopping 15 studio albums and more than 150 million record sales worldwide.
Diana Ross
Manchester Arena, July 3 and 19
A Glastonbury Legends slot and a UK tour - 2020 is the year of Diana Ross.
The Supremes icon is coming to Manchester on her Top Of The World tour - a title that seems to sum up how she’s feeling about it.
“I am in total appreciation of all. I’m feeling great, life is so good. My love, my light is steady and constant. I focus on joy,” the singer tweeted when she announced the news.
“I love looking at the energy all around me. I am so so so grateful.”
Bluedot
Jodrell Bank, July 23 to 26
Set against the awe-inspiring backdrop of the Lovell Telescope, the festival of music, science and cosmic culture returns to Jodrell Bank Observatory in 2020.
The line up has yet to be revealed, but with past headliners including The Flaming Lips, Kraftwerk, New Order and Jean-Michel Jarre, music-lovers can expect to find a bill that blends the cutting edge of electronica and psychedelia.
Manchester Pride Citywide, August 28 to 31 Expanded and reshaped for 2019, the city’s LGBT+ festival showcased its biggest music line up yet.
Acts including Ariana Grande and Years & Years performed at the new Manchester Pride Live event at Depot, while the Gay Village hosted yet more acts in Sackville Gardens.
The details of next year’s event have yet to be announced but clear your diaries for the August bank holiday weekend.
Celine Dion Manchester Arena, September 4 and 5 Canadian icon Celine Dion is up another gear in 2020, graduating from the relatively humble stage of the O2 Ritz, where she played in February last year, to two dates at Manchester Arena, which are both sold out. returning to play her first Manchester shows since 2008 with two dates at the Arena.
She was due to headline two shows at the venue in 2017, but they were relocated to the First Direct Arena in Leeds following the devastating Manchester terror attack that year.
The concerts form part of Dion’s Courage World Tour, which will support her recently-released album of the same name.
Throughout her incredible career she’s sold more than 200 million records worldwide, won five Grammy Awards including Album of the Year and released hits including My Heart Will Go On and It’s All Coming Back to Me Now.
Stormzy
Manchester Arena, September 17 Man of the moment Stormzy is heading back out on tour in support of his newly-released second album Heavy Is The Head.
The H.I.T.H. world tour is the grime star’s biggest live offering to date, taking him to 55 venues all over the world including Manchester Arena.
It’s a big leap up in venue size after his last shows in the city in 2017, when he played Manchester Academy and the Sounds of the Near Future stage at Parklife.
But with a platinum-selling debut album, Gang Signs and Prayer, and a Glastonbury headline slot now under his belt, it’s arenas and stadiums all the way from here.
Elton John
Manchester Arena, November 17 and 28
The Rocket Man is touching down in Manchester for his farewell tour in 2020.
His Yellow Brick Road Tour kicked off in the US in September 2018 and will see him perform around 300 dates around the world by the end of the three year trek.
It’ll be fans’ last chance to see him play his extensive back catalogue, which includes Tiny Dancer, I’m Still Standing and Your Song.