Corey Smith brings his 21-years-on-the-road tour to the Bijou on Feb. 18

The independent Georgia songwriter who built a following one club at a time is booked into Knoxville's 700-seat Bijou Theatre for a Thursday night in February.

Some country careers start with a record deal. Corey Smith's started in a classroom. He taught high school in Georgia, then took a chance on music and self-released his songs. Twenty-one years of touring later, he's booked into one of Knoxville's best rooms to celebrate.

Corey Smith plays the Bijou Theatre on Thursday, Feb. 18, 2027, at 7:30 p.m., according to the show's Ticketmaster listing. The stop is part of his 21 After 21 Tour: Celebrating 21 Years On The Road, which was announced on Oct. 20. Trea Landon is listed as support.

Knoxville sits near the front of the run. Ticketmaster shows dates in Starkville, Miss., on Feb. 5 and at Atlanta's Buckhead Theatre on Feb. 6. After Knoxville come Joe's on Weed Street in Chicago on Feb. 26, Brooklyn Bowl in Nashville on March 11 and Soul Kitchen in Mobile, Ala., on March 19. Most of those are clubs and theaters about the Bijou's size. That's the scale Smith has worked at for most of his career, and it's where his shows tend to be at their best.

His story is a grassroots one. According to his official bio, Smith grew up in Jefferson, Ga., graduated from the University of Georgia and taught high school briefly before going full time on music. He built his audience with relentless touring and self-released records: a debut, *Undertones*, in 2003, then *The Good Life* in 2005 and *Hard-Headed Fool* in 2007. That's how a following grew across Southern college towns before Nashville took much notice.

The industry did catch up for a while. *The Broken Record*, released in 2011 through Average Joe's Entertainment, reached No. 17 on Billboard's country chart, his bio says. In 2015 he worked with Sugar Hill Records on *While the Gettin' Is Good*. Through the mid-2020s, the site says, he has kept writing, recording and touring on his own terms, often playing more than 100 shows a year. Ticketmaster's artist page quotes him calling himself a "progressive country" musician. That label fits a catalog that has always leaned more toward plainspoken storytelling than polish.

Twenty-one years in, the tour is named for the road itself — which is about right for an artist whose road was the whole strategy.

That's why the Bijou fits so well. It holds 700, which is big enough to feel like an event and small enough that a sing-along carries all the way to the back. For an artist whose fans have been shouting his lyrics back at him for two decades, a theater that size is close to ideal. Knoxville also sits squarely in the Southeast circuit Smith has worked all these years. Plenty of people in the seats will have seen him in smaller rooms on the way up.

A few practical notes. It's a Thursday, so plan around the work week. If the 21-year theme means a career-spanning setlist, the early records will likely get their due. The tour's name strongly suggests it, but neither Smith nor the venue has published a setlist.

Twenty-one years ago, Corey Smith was a teacher with a guitar and some songs nobody had asked for. On Feb. 18 he'll stand on the Bijou stage with a whole room that has.

Tickets and details: Corey Smith – 21 After 21 Tour, Bijou Theatre, Knoxville.

Sources: Corey Smith – 21 After 21 Tour, Knoxville, Feb 18 2027 — Ticketmaster (ticketmaster.com); Corey Smith Tickets, 2026-2027 Concert Tour Dates — Ticketmaster (ticketmaster.com); About — Corey Smith (coreysmith.com)