Tuesday, February 10th brought together Connecticut Country 92.5 and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital for the annual Concert for Kids at the Cadillac Ranch in Southington, CT. Our friends at Country 92.5 were gracious enough to invite New England Country Music to attend this amazing benefit concert. The show brought together three of the hottest musical duo’s in country music, Dan + Shay, the Swon Brothers, and Brothers Osborne. The three bands are wildly successful on their own, all with recent radio hits and each nominated for the 2015 Academy of Country Music Award for Vocal Duo of the Year.
The venue was teaming with people, another sold out crowd happy to be there to benefit for the Children’s Hospital, and to see a night full of incredible music. The opener for the show was local talent Courtney Drummey, who put on a great set in her short time on-stage. Some may remember her from when she got to duet with Keith Urban this past summer in Hartford.
As 7:30 rolled around, the audience was thrilled to discover that all three duo’s were coming onstage together, and cheers filled the room as they started filling a row of barstools with nothing but microphones and acoustic guitars. John and T.J. Osborne began the show, and had the crowd clapping in unison to the song, ‘Let’s Go There.’ Next down the line was Zach and Colton Swon treating us to a new song, ‘Pray For You.’ At the end of the row came Dan + Shay, surprising everyone by beginning their turn with 2014 top 40 hit ‘Show You Off,’ which had the entire hall singing along to the chorus with them.
As the duo from Deale, Maryland took their mic, T.J Osborne, donning his signature Baltimore Orioles hat and told the crowd “We’re from down in Maryland, people think that you have to be from the south to be country, but you here in New England know better than that,” and kicked into their hometown anthem, ‘Down Home.’ Next, Zach Swon grabbed his mic scanning the crowd asking “There’s a lot of beautiful ladies in the audience tonight, with Valentine’s Day around the corner, who would you choose? Do you want a man, or a boy?” as he jokingly pointed to his brother Colton, leading into their song ‘Pretty Beautiful.’ Going along with the Valentine’s Day theme, Dan + Shay came up, Dan Smyers apologized for making us share the evening with them, with Shay Mooney confessing, “There’s a lot of pretty girls here tonight, and I don’t happen to have a Valentine yet,” bringing us into their newest single about to hit country radio, ‘Nothing Like You.’
Continuing into the evening brought us another single about to hit country radio, this time from the Brothers Osborne, ‘Stay a Little Longer,’ with an instrumental guitar jam in the middle, and raising beers to the ceiling to cheers the audience sending it back down the line to the Swon Brothers. They told us, “We worked on this next song with somebody called Carrie Underwood, but she couldn’t make it here with us tonight,’ kicking into the song ‘This Side of Heaven.’ Dan + Shay threw the crowd for a loop with their next choice, 1989 hit ‘Free Fallin,’ recorded by Tom Petty. They had the entire hall singing the chorus with them, wrapping it up with a deafening roar for St. Jude and America. After the song, The Brothers Osborne couldn’t help but joke around by asking Dan + Shay how they knew the words to the song. This light hearted swipe at the two ‘youngsters’ drew laughs from all on-stage and the audience.
The Brothers Osborne concluded their set with 2014 mega hit ‘Rum,’ which had the crowd joining in on the duo’s fan favorite song. The Swon Brothers wrapped up their performance with their smash hit, ‘Later On.’ Leaving Dan + Shay the finale, they invited everybody to come down to the stage for their own top ten hit, ’19 You and Me.’ There wasn’t and empty seat left in the house to applaud the groups as they left the stage. Country 92.5 did a spectacular job bringing country stars together for an amazing acoustic performance, and raising awareness and funds towards the St. Jude Research Hospital, and by the looks of it, the benefit will only grow in the coming years.
You can listen to Country 92.5 on-line. Also please make sure to go check out the St. Jude website to learn more about this amazing organization, learn about the kids and families that they help and most importantly… to make a donation.
All photos are courteously provided to New England Country Music by and credited to the Country 92.5 staff!