Austin Christy, 11, showed up at John Mayer’s concert in Philadelphia on Sunday night with a sign that featured a hand drawn guitar and a request – “Can I play ‘Belief’ with you?” Mayer couldn’t resist, so he invited the little boy on stage to play a duet, a dream come true for the boy who has memorized all of Mayer’s songs.
“I was really excited. I was thinking that it wasn’t real,” the New Jersey sixth-grader told reporters after the show. He also told the Courier Post Online that he “thought it was pretty cool because of a lot of other artists wanted to play with him and he picked an 11-year-old out of a lot better artists.” Austin says that he learned “Belief” for his mom, JoAnna, who was there with him on his big night.
Mayer also gifted the boy the red Squier guitar and guitar picks that Austin borrowed from him for the show, signing the guitar’s base: “To Austin, You rock. Keep playing. See you at your show.”
Austin wasn’t the only one who had the time of his life Sunday night. Mayer, who has been burdened with scandal after a poor choice of words in a Playboy interview led to accusations of racism against the singer, tweeted for the first time in quite a while the night of the show. Saying that “8 out of 8 band members agree, Philly is always an awesome show. XO J” For a frequent tweeter, a return to cyber space over sharing seems like a good indication of better spirits.
