Rod Stewart, 79, Announces ‘End of Large Scale World Tours’ but Has No Plans to Retire: 'I Do What I Love'

Mar. 15, 2025

Rod Stewart.Photo:Iwi Onodera/Redferns

Iwi Onodera/Redferns

Rod Stewart’s days of touring the world are over.

In a post shared onInstagramon Wednesday, Nov. 20, the 79-year-old rocker announced that he’s hanging up his microphone when it comes to large-scale tours — though he said he has no plans to retire just yet.

“This will be the end of large-scale world tours for me, but I have no desire to retire,” he wrote in a statement. “I love what I do, and I do what I love.”

“I’m fit, have a full head of hair, and can run 100 meters in 18 seconds at the jolly old age of 79,” he continued, before sharing his plans for what he’d like to do next in his career.

“I’d like to move onto a Great American Songbook, Swing Fever tour the year after next — smaller venues and more intimacy,” he wrote,

Stewart’s announcement comes after he revealed earlier this month that hisOne Last Time tour will hit the U.S. and Canadafor 20 new shows starting in March in Austin, Texas and ending in St. Louis in August.

The musician, who previously took the tour across Europe and Asia, will also play 13 Las Vegas shows at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace from March through June.

Rod Stewart in February 2024.Dave Benett/Getty

Dave Benett/Getty

Stewart released his 33rd studio albumSwing Feverin February with Jools Holland.

In 2023, the singer opened up to PEOPLE about hisdesire to stop doing large-scale toursand again insisted that he wasn’t retiring.

“This will be the last time ‘round, I think, to do the rock ‘n’ roll stuff because I want to move on to swing music and the Great American Song Book,” he said. “But I’mnot taking my songs to the cemetery and burying them. I might bring them out on the odd occasion, but I basically would like to put them to rest for a little while. No more big tours. I’ve said farewell to Australia and New Zealand and Mexico, so it’s time to say farewell to the U.S. now.”

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Rod Stewart and his wife Penny Lancaster with six of his eight children.Rod Stewart/Instagram

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Stewart is a dad toeight children. His two youngest — Alastair Wallace, 18, and Aiden Patrick, 13, whom he shares with his wifePenny Lancaster— live with the pair in their L.A. home.

source: people.com