Garth Brooks is leaving his daughters high and dry to re-ignite his career in Nashville!
Garth’s country star wife Trisha Yearwood recently revealed that they are plotting their move from Claremore, Okla., to Music City, saying: “We’re excited for whatever’s next for us.”
But that excitement apparently doesn’t transfer to Garth’s kids from his first marriage to Sandy Brooks, daughters Taylor, 22, August, 19, and Allie, 17.
“Even though Garth’s daughters are all young adults, they still want their daddy close by,” a family friend told the ENQUIRER. “But Garth is driven to launch the biggest second act in country music history, and he feels he has to be where the action is – Nashville.”
Brooks, country music’s all-time best-selling artist, lived with Sandy in Nashville until their 2001 divorce.
Garth, 52, stunned the world when he announced his retirement from the music business, moved back to his native Oklahoma and vowed not to return until Allie graduated from high school.
In the meantime, he married longtime friend Yearwood, 49, in 2005 and lived near sandy in Oklahoma as they shared parental duties.
“The girls were so young when the family left Nashville they barely even remember it,” said another friend.
“Garth has told them he’ll spring for plane tickets whenever they want to see him, but it’s hard to break away from their lives in Oklahoma and travel more than 600 miles to Nashville on a whim. They don’t like this one bit.”
The friend adds it’s especially hard on August, who gave birth to Garth’s first grandchild, Karalynn, last July.
As The ENQUIRER reported, Garth was happy about becoming a grandfather but brokenhearted that August was an unwed teenage mom. Still, he stood by her.
But now, Garth is moving full-steam ahead with his career reboot and has already sold out all 400,000 tickets for a five-date July engagement in Dublin, Ireland.
“Garth is the biggest phenomenon country music has ever seen and obviously there’s a pent-up demand since he’s been away from touring for so long,” noted a source.
“And knowing Garth, he’ll be back recording and throwing himself into this comeback with everything he has. I can see why, if he’s going to do this right, he’d want to be back living in Nashville.”
And Yearwood believes the time is right for the move since Allie starts college in the fall. “Garth and I both feel the job of being home every day and going to every soccer practice, that job is coming to an end for us,” she explained. “It’s time for us to do the next thing.”
But it doesn’t make the move any less painful for Garth’s girls.
“They’ve had a stay-at-home dad since they were little, and there’s a lot of separation anxiety,” said the first friend. “They know Garth loves them, but they’re not happy about losing him to his career.”
