Keith Richards Surprises Nashville at Country Music Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony

There sure has been a lot of discourse this year about who can play country music. But at the Country Music Hall of Fame’s annual Medallion Ceremony on Sunday, officially inducting this year’s class, the answer was “anyone who showed up.”

That included two members of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Keith Richards and Elvis Costello; Nashville’s latest pop arrival, Post Malone; bluegrass pioneer Del McCoury; Americana poet Lucinda Williams; and genre pillars Vince Gill and Emmylou Harris.

All of them, along with Eric Church, Blake Shelton, and Brad Paisley, gathered to perform in honor of the 2024 inductees: innovative chicken-pickin’ guitarist James Burton, Florida drawler John Anderson, and against-the-grain singer-songwriter Toby Keith, who died in February.

Richards’ appearance was kept tightly under wraps — supposedly even Burton, in whose honor he performed, didn’t know the Rolling Stones guitarist was in the building until Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum CEO Kyle Young announced Richards to the stage. But there he was in all his roguish glory — dressed in a white beanie, leather jacket, and black sneakers — clutching a big fat Gibson. Joined by Gill and Harris, and Rolling Stones drummer Steve Jordan, he sang and played his way through a ramshackle but delightful “I Can’t Dance,” a Tom T. Hall song recorded by Gram Parsons in 1973. “We made it, James,” Richards said to Burton, seated in the front row, before restarting the house band — featuring Charlie Worsham and Biff Watson — for a rollicking outro jam.

Prior to Richards’ cameo, Gill backed Harris and Rodney Crowell on “Till I Gain Control Again,” a Crowell song that Harris cut for her 1975 Elite Hotel album. Like Parsons’ recording of “I Can’t Dance,” Burton lent his unmistakable Telecaster style to the track. Throughout his career, Burton also played with Glen Campbell, John Denver, and, most famously, Elvis Presley. It was another Elvis that saluted Burton at the Medallion Ceremony: Elvis Costello and Desert Rose Band guitarist John Jorgenson teamed up for “Believe What You Say,” the 1958 Ricky Nelson song on which Burton played when he was just a teenager. Paisley rounded out the segment, roaring through Merle Haggard’s “Workin’ Man Blues” and praising Burton as the guitarist most important to country music.

If Burton’s induction was high-wattage rock & country, then Toby Keith’s was the most emotional. For all the brashness that defined his career — writing his own songs, standing proudly patriotic, eschewing Nashville for his native Oklahoma — his portion of the evening was full of subtle notes and poignant remembrances, with two exceptions. Post Malone started the music with a faithful, full-band rendition of Keith’s 2001 hit “I’m Just Talkin’ About Tonight” (a song he performed Saturday night during his headlining show at Nashville’s Nissan Stadium), while Shelton dialed up his charisma for the shot-chaser combo of “I Love This Bar” and “Red Solo Cup.” The latter has always been inherently goofy, a fact that Keith himself knew every time he performed it; Shelton did too, reveling in the chance to add levity to Keith’s bittersweet induction.

In between Post and Shelton, it was Church who hushed the room. With Keith’s widow and family sitting in the front row, he accompanied himself on a solo acoustic reading of Keith’s ballad on mortality, “Don’t Let the Old Man In.” Church has often credited Keith with helping launch his career — the two toured together frequently — and onstage at the CMA Theater he made a point of doing so again.

Anderson’s induction kicked off the evening. Known for an idiosyncratic country voice that made every song uniquely his, the “Swingin’” singer watched as Shawn Camp crooned “I Just Came Home to Count the Memories,” McCoury led his string group through “Would You Catch a Falling Star,” and Williams lovingly warbled “Wild & Blue.”

Burton was inducted by Gill, Keith by Alabama’s Randy Owen, and Anderson by the songwriter Bobby Braddock. Tanya Tucker, herself inducted in the Country Music Hall of Fame last year, closed the evening with an audience singalong of “Will the Circle Be Unbroken.”