“Oh Gosh.”
That was all Lauren Alaina got out on Saturday night before she burst out laughing. She had just landed on the stage floor in the middle of a song, with the whole crowd watching.
It happened on Nov. 7 at the Potter Center at Jackson College in Jackson, Michigan. Lauren was one show from the end of The Stages Tour, her headlining run behind her new album “Stages.” The tour wraps up this Thursday, Nov. 12, at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville.
If the name rings a bell, Lauren is the Georgia girl who finished second to Scotty McCreery on “American Idol” in 2011, when she was 16. She went on to a No. 1 hit with “Road Less Traveled” and a huge duet with Kane Brown, “What Ifs.” Trisha Yearwood, her childhood hero, welcomed her into the Grand Ole Opry in 2022.
On Saturday she was in the middle of “Ladies in the ’90s,” her 2018 salute to the women she grew up singing along to. Country Now reports that she was walking backward across the stage as she sang. Her white boots caught a set of stairs in the center of the stage, and down she went, right onto her bottom.
A fan in the crowd had a phone up and caught the whole thing. A member of her band hurried over and helped her to her feet. Neither Country Now nor Backstage Country, which also covered the fall, reported any injury. She went on with the show.
First, though, she had a few things to say.
“Well, at least you know the mic’s on,” she told the crowd. That was her way of pointing out that she sings live every night, and a fall like that proves it.
Then she thought about what she was wearing.
“Thank God I put shorts on under my dress,” Lauren said. “So many things could have gone wrong there!”
She did not blame the stairs, either. According to Country Now, she told the audience they had been in the same spot for the whole tour. “You know that thing has been on stage every night,” she said. “That was not a surprise to me that that is back there.”
When the fan’s video made the rounds online, Lauren showed up under it herself. Her comment borrowed a famous line from the Sandra Bullock comedy “Miss Congeniality”: “She’s beauty and she’s grace,” with a laughing face after it.
The fan video lives on TikTok and has not been posted to YouTube. Here is the official video for the song she was singing when her boots found those stairs.
Lauren Alaina’s official video for “Ladies in the ’90s”
The tumble came on the eve of a big day. Lauren turned 32 on Sunday, Nov. 8, and Country Now reports she started celebrating with her band and crew the night before. She later shared a clip of her mom doing her hair for the occasion and thanked fans for the birthday wishes. “32 is looking pretty good so far,” she wrote.
It has been a good fall in other ways. Backstage Country notes that “All My Exes,” her duet with Chase Matthew, reached the top of Billboard’s Country Airplay chart dated Oct. 24. The Grand Ole Opry shared this short clip of Lauren talking about the album it comes from.
Lauren talks about her new album “Stages” for the Opry
Thursday’s Ryman show is the last one on the schedule. The stairs, by her own account, will be right where they have been all tour. The shorts are probably a safe bet too.