Eric Church is absolutely slaying his sold-out audiences on his Holdin’ My Own Tour, and he starts the musical assault with the song, “Mistress Named Music,” in which he brings out a local high school choir to finish the song. He realized since he’s already performing, he needed some help bringing the choir on stage, so he gave his five-year-old son, Boone, a job.

“Choir Wrangler is what he does…And Boone’s got a radio, he’s got his flashlight, he’s got a little work belt and his pass, he goes in there, and he’ll make sure that when the choir’s ready to go, it’s his job and Jill’s job to move these teenagers – he calls them teenagers – with flashlights over to where the show is,” says Eric. “Now what Boone proceeds to do is call me the entire time to see how close we are. My road manager, my tour manager, said, ‘I’ve been trying to get you on stage on time for a decade, and your son has a better chance of that.’ Because Boone, you tell a five-year-old we’re getting close, and you put it back down and 20 seconds later, ‘You comin’?’ ‘We’re getting close.’ But you know, it’s this constant, he’s wearing me out. [laughs] So, we do get to the stage quicker than we used to, but his job is to get them up underneath the stage and then up the steps on the stage; he waits at the bottom, they come back off, and he escorts them to where they need to go. He’s helping out, and he’s having a big time with it.”

A few weeks into his gig on the tour, Boone did negotiate a new deal with his father. “About three weeks into the tour, [Boone] goes, ‘Dad, I really don’t like my job.’ And I said, ‘Well, son, a lot of people don’t like their job.’ I said, ‘The important thing is you’ve got to do your job.’  I said, ‘What don’t you like basically?’ He said, ‘Eh, it’s boring, and I don’t get paid.’ And I said, ‘Okay, did you have catering? Yeah. Do you have a nice bus to ride on? Yeah.’ I said, ‘Well, you got paid.’ He said, ‘Well, yeah, but the band gets paid.’ So, I humor him. I said, ‘Okay, Boone. I’m gonna humor you. How much would you want to get paid.’ He goes, ‘$4,000.’ I said, ‘A show?’ He goes, ‘Yeah.’ I said, ‘How ‘bout a dollar?’ like that. He let me negotiate, and we agree on $10 a show, and I shake his hand, and I’m thinking, ‘Good God, I just got hustled.’ So, I shake his hand, and as he’s walking away, he goes, ‘That’s $30 for the weekend, right?’”

Eric takes his Holdin’ My Own Tour north of the border on Tuesday (February 28th) in London, Ontario, Canada, followed by dates in Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Calgary, Winnipeg and more before returning to the States March 16th in Portland, Oregon.

Eric has released his new single, “Round Here Buzz,” which is scheduled to go for adds at radio April 10th.