Jimmy Buffett opens the Blossom season Sunday, and we'll all be there: Chuck Yarborough

CLEVELAND, Ohio - It's a wonder that Jimmy Buffett even has time to tour. He's opening retirement communities, hotels, restaurants, Broadway shows and releasing career retrospectives.

Jiminy Christmas! It's no surprise Fortune magazine put the net worth of the beloved singer-songwriter who opens the Blossom Music Center season on Sunday, May 27, at just shy of $600 million a couple of years ago. Clearly, he's not just wasting away in Margaritaville.

Homes in Latitude Margaritaville retirement communities in Daytona Beach, Florida, and Hilton Head, South Carolina, are going to be in the $200,000 to $300,000 range, according to the Panama City News Herald. A page on the Latitude Margaritaville website is full of stories about the lifestyle, the on-site bars, etc.

He's got hotels and resorts in Key West and other parts of Florida and the Caribbean, as you might expect, but also in places like Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg, Tennessee, as well as in Mississippi and Louisiana. And he's building them in Costa Rica and the Bahamas, among other locales.

His Broadway show, "Escape to Margaritaville," has an open-ended run on the Great White Way, although there are rumors it's shutting down at the end of the year. But a nationwide tour is in the works. No word yet on whether Cleveland will be on that itinerary. However, it's safe to bet a few million cheeseburgers in paradise that it will.

Then there's the Margaritaville restaurants that dot the countryside, including here in Cleveland.

The Plain Dealer tried to talk to him about all that for this story, or about Sunday's concert, whichever, but he was unavailable. Guess we can see why.

But the question isn't really, "Why won't Jimmy Buffett do tour press?'' but "Why is Jimmy Buffett still touring instead of sitting on a boat counting the money he already has?" Even if all 20,000 Blossom tickets were the maximum $146 - they're not, just FYI - it'd still be a drop in his financial bucket.

Only he can answer that, but it's likely that he's got that Musician Malady: They CAN'T retire, even if they wanted to call it a day and head to the beach. Look at Tony Bennett, who's 91 and still tours on a regular basis. True, Elton John and Phil Collins have said they're retiring. So did Motley Crue on the first of seven or eight farewell tours before they finally called it quits as a band. And you've got all the other legacy acts - Yes, Chicago, Huey Lewis & the News, etc. - who keep the Hard Rock Rocksino in business.

And, most importantly, are doing great shows, too, in large part.

I suspect Buffett also has a little bit of Dollar Disease, too. As in, "ain't no such thing as too much money.'' To some degree, I get that. As you know, he started his career as a stringer for Billboard in Nashville - his big story was on the breakup of the duo Flatt & Scruggs, the guys behind the theme song for "The Beverly Hillbillies."

That didn't work out for him, so he decided to head further south and start making music instead of writing about it. See, "Journalist" and "Rich" are not even words in the same dictionary. I qualified for food stamps and public housing for the first 15 years of my career. True story, and it's why I continue to labor for my own megamillions (where is that sarcasm font button?).

Those are probably some of the reasons he still performs - as I say, without a chance to ask him directly, it's hard to confirm.

But why do you and other Parrotheads keep going? It's not like he's going to break out new songs, or reinvent the beach umbrella.

But maybe that's exactly why we keep going. You know exactly what you're going to get at a Buffett show.

This is what I wrote after seeing his 2014 show . . . and it's something I could have written after seeing his first sold-out Blossom show 23 years before that:

Yeah, a lot of his songs are fun, and there were plenty in the two-hour set he delivered to the rain-soaked crowd at Blossom. "Cheeseburger in Paradise," "Volcano,'' "Margaritaville,'' "It's Five O'Clock Somewhere'' (which segued into and out of "Why Don't We Get Drunk'') and of course, the king of audience-participation songs, "Fins.''

Then there's "Too Drunk to Karaoke,'' originally a duet with Toby Keith and the irreverent hangover anthem, "My Head Hurts, My Feet Stink and I Don't Love Jesus.''

If you go to a Jimmy Buffett concert and don't laugh or smile at some point in time, someone needs to hold a mirror under your nose to see if you're breathing. Here, I'll hold your beer while you check.

But that show also gave Buffett a chance to showcase his other side, the songs like the wrenching "Come Monday,'' and to cover Zac Brown Band's "Free,'' segueing - as the ZBB does - into Van Morrison's "Into the Mystic."

And that's why we all keep going. Yeah, there's way too much getting drunk, way too many men in coconut bras, way too much attention to fake shark fins.

Jimmy Buffett at this stage in his life is amassing money through restaurants, hotels, retirement homes, whatever. But he is, first and foremost, an entertainer and a singer. One who is able to do all the cliche things, like touch your heart and your funny bone with equal skill and elan.

He will be 72 on Christmas Day, and somehow, that seems fitting. Not that he's aging; we all are, and no amount of corporate entrepreneurship can stop that. No, it's fitting that he came into this world on a day that celebrates the gifts, smiles and love.

And of course, that much-loved holiday tradition, the Christmas Cheeseburger.

PREVIEW

Jimmy Buffett and the Coral Reefer Band

When:

8 p.m. Sunday, May 27.

Where:

Blossom Music Center, 1145 W. Steels Corners Road, Cuyahoga Falls.

Tickets:

$36 to $146, plus fees, at the box office, online at

and

and by phone at 1-800-745-3000.

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