Billy Strings played a show Friday night in Lexington, Kentucky, and it's a concert that anyone who attended or watched online won't forget anytime soon.
Strings came out on stage at the start and said "This is probably going to be one of the hardest things I’ve ever done… How tonight’s gonna turn out is kinda up in the air, it depends on how much strength I can muster and how much I can lean on y’all."
Strings then told the audience that he'd been woken up by a phone call from his wife Friday morning telling him that his mom Debra Apostol had passed away in her sleep.
Strings said that he made the decision to proceed with the concert “because that’s what my mom would’ve wanted me to do... She really loved this group of people. She loved y’all so much. The last couple years were some of her happiest because of a lot of you folks right here. Y’all became some of her best friends, and I really want to thank you for that… The reason I decided not to go home and be with my family right now is because I already am.”
He then asked the crowd to make noise for his mother, and during that moment he stood and weeped. Strings opened his first set by playing “I’ve Just Seen the Rock of Ages," which includes lyrics about saying goodbye to your mother as she’s crossing “the river Jordan” to be “homeward bound.”
During his second set he told the crowd that his mom taught a song to him that led to a win at a fourth grade talent contest and that he was going to play it. It was Pearl Jam’s “Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town.”
Strings played the second of his two shows in Lexington on Saturday night, and now has a break until July 15th when he starts an Australian tour.