Garth Brooks, Bob Doyle, Ben Farrell, Joe Harris Named To IEBA Hall Of Fame

Bob Doyle with Garth Brooks in 1988. Photo: Courtesy Splash PR

Garth Brooks, Bob Doyle, Ben Farrell, and the late Joe Harris will be inducted into the International Entertainment Buyers Association (IEBA) Hall of Fame during this year’s 46th annual IEBA Conference. The ceremony will take place in Nashville on Tuesday, Oct. 11.

During his decades in the business, Brooks has become one of the world’s best-selling artists, with six albums that sold 10 million-plus. Brooks is booked in-house and managed by Bob Doyle & Associates. His tour is promoted exclusively by Ben Farrell, president of Lon Varnell Enterprises.

Pictured (L-R): Ben Farrell, Tom Paquette, Garth Brooks and Tim Reese at Thompson Boling Arena. Photo: Courtesy Splash PR

Booking agent Harris first heard Brooks in 1988 and immediately signed him to Buddy Lee Attractions. “Uncle Joe, you know we owe it to you,”  a lyric from “The Old Stuff” on Brooks’s 1995 release Fresh Horses, is a musical tribute to Harris, who died in 1996.

Garth Brooks with Joe Harris. Photo: Alan Mayor

“I was lucky that the people I found in those first couple of years were on the side of writers, artists, and musicians,” Brooks told Patsi Bale Cox for her book The Garth Factor. “I met too many creative people who had been run over by the business and I won’t say it made me paranoid, but it did make me watchful.”

IEBA’s Hall of Fame includes Dick Clark, Johnny Cash & Lou Robin, The Doobie Brothers, Erv Woolsey, Dale Morris, George & Nancy Jones, and Pat Benatar & Neil Giraldo.