STARS officially announces Sugarland concert

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>> Tickets for the STARS event go on sale at 10 a.m. Friday at the Dodge Arena box office, 2600 N. 10th St., Hidalgo.

>> For more information on STARS, visit www.southtexasstars.org.

>> For more information on tickets, visit www.dodgearena.com.

McALLEN — The next big country act coming to the Rio Grande Valley was announced Friday.

Hit country duo Sugarland will be playing Dodge Arena on Sept. 9 this year, announced Tony Forina, executive director of L&F Distributors and board member of South Texas Academic Rising Scholars, or STARS.

Scheduled to open for Sugarland are country artist Billy Currington and folk-rocker Matt Nathanson.

The announcement was made Friday morning at a news conference where chairman of the STARS board, Joe LaMantia Jr., spoke briefly about the importance of education and how it relates to the state of the economy.

"It all revolves around education," he said.

A nonprofit, STARS was established in 2002 to award scholarships for students of the South Texas community, including Laredo and Corpus Christi. More than $12 million and 5,000 scholarships have been awarded in the past five years. Universities work with STARS to match its scholarships at least dollar for dollar.

Sugarland burst onto the country music scene in 2004 with its hit single "Baby Girl." Since then, the group has collected several American Music Awards and accolades from the Academy of Country Music. Most recently, the band was named the Country Music Association's 2008 "Vocal Duo of the Year." Sugarland's acoustic hit "Stay" garnered the group a Grammy last year.

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Amy Nichol Smith covers features and entertainment for The Monitor. She can be reached at (956) 683-4420.