On Sunday, Aug. 28, Aaron Tveit, Andy Grammer, and Gavin DeGraw all gave a mind- blowing performance on the Bethel Woods Center for the Arts stage! What a wonderful way to kick off their co-headlining Home at Last tour in their home state. All of these performing acts were grateful to be "Home at Last."
The opening act was Aaron Tveit who is known for his appearances in Next to Normal and the production of Catch Me If You Can on Broadway; he’s widely known for his several appearances on Gossip Girl and his most recent appearance as Danny Zuko in Fox’s production of Grease: LIVE. Aaron Tveit gave a stunning performance in Grease:LIVE, and he did beautiful covers of Radiohead’s Creep, Use Somebody by Kings of Leon along with other personal favorites of his.
After Aaron Tveit made a moving performance, Andy Grammer opened with Keep Your Head Up from his first self-titled album. Keep Your Head Up was featured in the popular movie Pitch Perfect and it was also his first single that went Platinum. During his first song he paused and said, “It’s good to be home...” Andy Grammer graduated from Monroe-Woodbury High School. He was also proud to say that Bethel Woods is very close to home for him. Andy Grammer gave a very memorable and entertaining performance; about halfway into the set of Blame It On The Stars Grammer started to play the trumpet. Andy Grammer played the piano, trumpet, and guitar during his performance. Grammar also started to dance during some of his sets and he sang Drake’s One Dance, All My Love by The Beatles, and he sang I Want You Back by the Jackson 5! Of course he could only sing a verse or two of each song in order for him to still have time to talk to the audience and perform his own songs. Andy Grammer is very local, and he explained to the crowd that you don't need to be from a big city like New York, or Los Angeles in order to follow your dreams. When he was a butcher, he revealed that he saw someone in concert and he pointed to the stage and said “that's going to be me someday." He also wrote the song Lunatic about his struggles to make it big as a music artist. He isn’t exactly making hit songs yet, but he is slowly getting there with his singles It’s Good To Be Alive(Hallelujah), Honey, I’m Good, and his most recent single Fresh Eyes. Andy Grammer also announced that he has a new album up his sleeve at some point (hopefully, in the near future!). It’s also a hidden fact that Andy Grammer’s mother died seven years ago and he dedicated his song Ladies to her. Andy Grammer was also on Dancing With The Stars and he was able to perform one of his songs on a float at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. He was expecting not to be that popular, but it turns out that a lot of mothers were coming up to him and commenting on his wonderful performances on Dancing With the Stars. He made a closing performance with It’s Good To Be Alive(Hallelujah); it might have been the end of his set, but it certainly wasn’t the last we’ve seen of Grammer! Andy Grammer gives a phenomenal performance with all of his musical talents, his dancing between songs, and his covers of a few different tracks between sets. His stage presence alone is remarkable, with a few added surprises his performances are outstanding!
Gavin DeGraw was up to perform, during intermission the whole staff at Bethel Woods packed up all of Andy Grammer’s set and in about thirty minutes, he was able to perform. Gavin DeGraw opened up with a hit off of his first album called Chariot and started playing back-to-back hit songs. When Gavin did his European tour, he wanted to strip his band down to just his drummist, guitarist, and himself. He wanted to make his stage presence feel more intimate with the crowd, even though he still required a bigger band for songs like Soldier. During his set he mentioned, “Where I come from is always my home and just a unbelievable life moment to be on this stage tonight in front of so many people that I know of.” After that being said, he introduced his next song Making Love With The Radio On off of his new album Something Worth Saving with a story of how he lost his “innocence." He said, “I don’t wanna tell you too much about me but, I lost my innocence on this exact field [in Bethel Woods]. I know some of you are looking at me and thinking ‘well, that’s disgusting.’. If it makes you feel any better it was on that side of the field [scanning the right side of the field]....”
He also sang several classics like American Woman by The Guess Who, We Are The Champions by Queen, and Hey Jude by The Beatles. After that stage performance he decided to walk around the crowd and into the field! On his way back to the stage, he was singing I Don’t Wanna Be and even though guards blocked him off, I still got a pretty good shot of him!
Some people made the mistake of leaving after his cover of We Are The Champions. After that first high note in Hey Jude, Andy Grammer came back out to sing with Gavin DeGraw! It was so cute to see that Gavin DeGraw and Andy Grammer had a special bond because they both are from Sullivan County in upstate New York. Andy Grammer came out skipping on stage with wide open arms and he hugged DeGraw on the piano, and then he sat down with him and started singing with him. It was both a beautiful and mind-blowing performance given by all of the performers: Aaron Tveit, Andy Grammer, and Gavin DeGraw. An especially memorable concert at Bethel Woods Center For The Arts.
