Photo courtesy of Dana Gorab

The last time I cried at a concert was the first time I knew for sure I wanted to be a star. It was the Lady Gaga concert in 2017, for her Joanne tour, and a friend had gotten a few of us tickets for my 17th birthday.

We had spent the last year laughing, screaming, crying along to and learning every word to the Joanne album, so one can imagine how elated we were all feeling to actually get to see it live. Actually, elated was an understatement. We spent the first half of the evening getting all dressed up and blasting the album with our pink cowboy hats (that we, of course, purchased specifically for that night), so we were more than ready to take the Joanne World Tour by storm.

When we arrived at the venue, we took our seats at the very back of the stadium, as we had gotten pretty cheap tickets, but one of my friends was determined to sneak closer (as most 17-year-olds are at a concert, unsupervised). To my surprise, as the show started we were able to sneak down a few sections closer into some empty seats, and as Stefani Germanotta took that stage, I genuinely couldn’t believe she was real.

It was my very first time setting eyes on someone in the flesh who I not only looked up to as a vocalist, performer, artist, creative and writer, but also just as a woman who has had such an incredulous impact and powerful influence on young women and the LGBTQIA+ community. Her music has had such an impact on the youth and pop culture as a whole.

Tears instantaneously flowed from my eyes, and not just because she was an icon to me, but because it was the first time I felt the real magic of music. The magic of someone so powerful and raw, who is able to channel things through song and bring thousands of people together for one moment in time, so that all of us out there, however different we may be, are able to have one heartbeat. The true power and magic of music. What music is truly all about.

That night meant the world to me. As I watched Lady Gaga on that stage, performing in ways I’ve never seen someone do, hitting every note, every movement in the choreography executed to perfection, the creativity and intention in the show itself, It filled my bones with an inexplicable knowing that for the rest of my life I wanted to have an influence on people in that way. I wanted to bring people together to laugh, scream, dance, rejoice and cry, the way Lady Gaga did for me that night.