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Willie Nelson’s Hollywood Bowl 90th birthday celebration is star-studded event

April 30, 2023

Three hours into an all-star celebration of Willie Nelson’s 90th birthday at the Hollywood Bowl, the birthday boy had yet to be seen. He was hanging out backstage as friends such as Lyle Lovett, Miranda Lambert, Chris Stapleton and Beck sang classic songs from his vast catalog.

But then, a little after 10 p.m., as Neil Young sang “Are There Anymore Real Cowboys?” with his sometimes bandmate Stephen Stills on guitar, out from the wings walked Willie, the man of the hour, and the fans that packed the Bowl on Saturday for the first of two birthday shows erupted into cheers and applause.

“I’d like to thank all the artists that came out to help us celebrate whatever we’re celebrating,” Nelson said as he settled into a chair at the center of the stage, his sons Micah and Lukas Nelson, who’d performed earlier in the evening, with guitars on either side of him.

And then it was on with the show, country star George Strait came out to play a pair of songs with Nelson, then Snoop Dogg for one, and finally the entire lineup for the finale of the first night of Long Story Short: An All-Star Celebration of Willie Nelson’s 90th.

Willie Nelson, center, plays with Neil Young, right, and Stephen Stills, left, during an all-star 90th birthday celebration for Nelson at the Hollywood Bowl on Saturday, April 29, 2023. (Photo by Jay Blakesberg, for Blackbird Presents)

Willie Nelson, right, plays with Snoop Dogg, left, during an all-star 90th birthday celebration for Nelson at the Hollywood Bowl on Saturday, April 29, 2023. (Photo by Josh Timmermans for Blackbird Presents)

Miranda Lambert sings “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” during Long Story Short: All-Star Concert Celebrating Willie Nelson’s 90th at the Hollywood Bowl on Saturday, April 29, 2023. (Photo by Jay Blakesberg for Blackbird Presents)

Kris Kristofferson and Roseanne Cash sing “Loving Her Was Easier (Than Anything I’ll Ever Do Again) during Long Story Short: All-Star Concert Celebrating Willie Nelson’s 90th at the Hollywood Bowl on Saturday, April 29, 2023. (Photo by Josh Timmermans for Blackbird Presents)

Warren Haynes of the Allman Brothers Band performs “Midnight Rider” at Long Story Short: All-Star Concert Celebrating Willie Nelson’s 90th” at the Hollywood Bowl on Saturday, April 29, 2023. (Photo by Randall Michelson)

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The show returns to the Hollywood Bowl Sunday, April 30, with a mostly different group of guest artists to celebrate Nelson’s second 90th birthday. Born on April 29, 1933, his birth certificate wasn’t completed and dated until April 30, 1933, so Nelson has always celebrated both.

The night opened at 7 p.m. sharp with the young country artist Billy Strings, with whom Nelson recently collaborated on Strings’ single “California Sober,” out to do “Whiskey River” and “Play a Little Longer,” and the party was underway with 40 songs and more than 30 guest artists over the next three-and-a-half hours.

Many of the performers shared a memory or two about Willie or the song they’d chosen before singing. Singer-songwriter Edie Brickell said Nelson’s music was the soundtrack to weekend housecleaning when she was a girl and that her father loved “Whiskey River” so much that it was played at his funeral.

“Willie is like a spirit guide,” she said before playing “Remember Me (When the Candlelights are Gleaming).” “He helped us work, he helped us play, he helped us grieve.”

Lyle Lovett chose Nelson’s “Hello Walls” because it seemed “the perfect song” from the moment he heard it as a boy in Houston. Margo Price noted she’d grown up on a farm and praised Nelson for his tireless work on behalf of farmers over the years before she and Nathaniel Rateliff sang the saucy, swinging “I Can Get Off on You,” which Nelson wrote with his close friend Waylon Jennings.

Performers came and went quickly, most only there for a single song, choosing either tunes written by Nelson or associated with him through his own covers and performances of them.

Norah Jones, who’s performed with Nelson’s band often over the years, played a pair including the piano instrumental “Down Yonder” in tribute to Nelson’s late sister Bobbie Nelson, who was the piano player in his band for nearly 50 years until her death at 91 in 2022.

In a show like this, it all feels special, one star after another coming out to pay tribute to a legend. But the appearance of Kris Kristofferson midway through Roseanne Cash‘s performance of Kristofferson’s “Loving Her Was Easier (Than Anything I’ll Ever Do Again)” felt like the first big emotional moment of the show. At 86, Kristofferson is no longer the robust figure of his younger days, but with Cash gently leading him, their duet was touching and beautiful.

Nelson’s long appreciation for all genres of music showed up in the disparate styles of each new artist on stage. Lukas Nelson sounded eerily like his father on a lovely version of “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground.” Texas blues singer and guitarist Gary Clark Jr. delivered a blast of energy with “Texas Flood,” a song most associated with fellow Texan Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Laidback singer-songwriter Jack Johnson got the crowd both laughing and singing along to “Willie Got Me Stoned and Took All My Money,” a song he said he wrote after unsuccessfully trying to keep up with Nelson at two of his favorite pursuits, smoking pot and playing poker.

The reggae grooves of Ziggy Marley singing “Still Is Moving to Me” blended somehow into the big-voiced pop of singer Tom Jones doing “Opportunity To Cry,” which in turn led to the hard country of Jamey Johnson on “Live Forever” and the slow blues of Bobby Weir of the Grateful Dead doing “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain.”

The bigger names – it’s all relative in a show like this – came in the back half of the set. The Chicks, who were introduced by actress Jennifer Garner to sing a rousing take on “Bloody Mary Morning.” (Garner, along with actors Owen Wilson, Ethan Hawke, and Helen Mirren, served as occasional emcees for the show.)

The Lumineers’ Wesley Schultz and Jeremiah Fraites did a beautiful version of Leon Russell’s “A Song For You” during which the crowd went as quiet as it was all night. Moments later, Nathaniel Rateliff and Miranda Lambert had loud fan choruses throughout their performances of “City of New Orleans” and “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys.”

As Nelson’s arrival on stage neared, Chris Stapleton, who the following night would be the headliner at the Stagecoach festival in Indio, arrived to sing a pair of songs, including a gorgeously moving version of “You Were Always on My Mind,” one of Nelson’s greatest covers.

Young and Stills cranked up the volume and energy just before 10 p.m. with “Long May You Run” and “For What It’s Worth,” the latter of which had fans on their feet to dance and sing, before Nelson finally appeared.

His set offered eight songs to close the night. George Strait, who’s been around so long you can forget how great he is, sang “Sing One With Willie,” his 2019 duet with Nelson, in which Strait amusingly bemoans how he’s never had that pleasure. He stuck around for another tune, the great “Pancho & Lefty,” which Nelson originally sang with the late Merle Haggard.

Snoop Dogg, who unlike Jack Johnson can definitely keep up with Nelson on at least one of his favorite pursuits, arrived to do “Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die,” the warmth of their friendship clear in the grins and laughter they shared throughout the number.

After the full lineup filed back on stage, Nelson led them through “Will the Circle Be Unbroken?” and “I’ll Fly Away,” and then led the full Bowl in singing “Happy Birthday” to himself – it’s Willie’s party, he can sing it any way he wants.

“It’s Hard to Be Humble,” a Mac Davis song Nelson covered on a recent record, closed out the night, with a bit of kind of tongue-in-cheek humor and a sly smile from Nelson.

“Oh Lord, it’s hard to be humble, when you’re perfect in every way,” he sang as the audience cheered. “I can’t wait to look in the mirror, ’cause I get better lookin’ each day.”

With that, and a wave to the crowd, he was gone, if only ’til the next night.

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