Bruce Springsteen has said he plans to make his Broadway debut this fall at the Walter Kerr theatre in a solo show in which he performs songs from his career, interspersed with readings of his bestselling memoir Born to Run.



Springsteen on Broadway begins previews 3 October ahead of a 12 October opening at the intimate 960-seat venue. The eight-week run is expected to play through 26 November. Springsteen will perform five shows a week.

“I wanted to do some shows that were as personal and as intimate as possible,” the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer said in a statement. “My show is just me, the guitar, the piano and the words and music. Some of the show is spoken, some of it is sung. It loosely follows the arc of my life and my work.”

The 67-year-old singer-songwriter becomes the latest and biggest artist in years to book a Broadway concert, a list that includes Il Divo, Barry Manilow, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons and the Rascals.

For Broadway theater owners, offering an empty venue to a band with a huge fanbase offers a way to make money between scheduled musicals or plays. For Springsteen, who has played everywhere from Red Rocks in Colorado to Madison Square Garden in New York City, it offers another notch his resume.

In Springsteen’s new book, he reveals that his first marriage, to Julianne Phillips, caused him mental anguish; that he had surgery for cervical-disc problems on the left side of his neck; and that he was depressed earlier in his sixties.