Topic: Kix Brooks

Kix Brooks (born Leon Eric Brooks, III May 12, 1955 in Shreveport, Louisiana, USA), is an American country music singer-songwriter. He is currently one half of the multi-award winning, American, country music duo Brooks & Dunn. Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn live down the street from each other in Brentwood, Tennessee, an upscale suburb of Nashville.

Brooks grew up in Shreveport, Louisiana. He has one sister, one half-sister, one half-brother and his father adopted one son of his third wife. He attended Riverside Elementary for grades K-5. After graduating from the former Sewanee Military Academy, an Episcopalian institution in Sewanee, Tennessee, Brooks attended Louisiana Tech University in Ruston, where he was a theatre arts major. He moved to Alaska to work for his father on an oil pipeline for one summer and then returned to Louisiana Tech to finish his education. He then moved to Maine and wrote advertising for a company owned by his sister and brother-in-law. Brooks married Barbara Brooks in 1981, and had two children, Molly and Eric.

His father urged him to pursue his desire to become a musician, and Brooks moved to Nashville in the early 1980s. His then girlfriend (now wife Barbara, with whom he has a son and daughter) followed shortly thereafter. He began working for Tree Publishing as a staff songwriter. He recorded his first solo single, Baby, When Your Heart Breaks Down, for Avion in 1983 but returned to songwriting after its failure. He also released an album, Kix Brooks, in 1989 on Capitol Records. This album also featured the song "Sacred Ground", which became a #2 country hit for McBride & the Ride in 1992.