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Brooks Concert Offered Beyond Hbo

Bill Carter New York Times

Buoyed by the popularity of the free Garth Brooks concert in Central Park last week, HBO said Monday it would repeat the show next month and make it available to all homes in the country with cable television, not just those that subscribe to HBO.

The concert, broadcast live on Thursday night, drew a crowd that HBO now estimates at 250,000, one of the largest ever for a concert in the park.

Brooks had asked HBO if it could repeat the show so more of his fans could see it.

HBO has not made any of its previous live concerts, including those by such stars as Barbra Streisand, Michael Jackson and Bette Midler, available to non-HBO subscribers.

But it agreed to repeat the Brooks concert on Sept. 13 and allow cable operators to unscramble its signal for the two-hour concert special.

That means that anyone with cable television will be able to see the show as long as the local cable system agrees to provide the technical work necessary to unscramble the HBO signal.

HBO has about 24 million subscribers. Cable television now reaches 65 million homes.