Kelsea Ballerini bursts into tears on stage while singing about her dog

Kelsea Ballerini performed from her new album, Patterns, in front of a sold-out Madison Square Garden crowd on Tuesday night (October 29), but it was a song from her latest record that brought her to tears.

Ballerini wore a rhinestone-embellished black jumpsuit and sang “Penthouse,” a song from her viral song Rolling up the welcome mat EP. It was the second to last song on the set list, and one lyric made the singer burst into tears.

As she sang, the audience sang back:

“I bought the house with a fence / Enough room for a couple of kids, a backyard for Dibs.”

Ballerini told fans in August that her goldendoodle dog, Dibs, has cancer in his heart. It’s unusable, the singer said at the time.

Unable to finish the song, the audience finished the chorus for her. As they sang, she took a step back, not only enjoying the moment but also letting her emotions flow.

“He’s not in any pain, and thankfully it hasn’t spread any further,” she told fans earlier this year.

Time with Dibs is something Ballerini cherishes, so having thousands of fans singing that part back to her touched her more deeply than in the past.

To end the evening, she scaled back her performance. She decided to end the night with “To the Men Who Love Women After Heartbreak,” a song that nods to her friend, actor Chase Stokes, who was in the crowd cheering her on.

In more fan-shot video footage, Stokes can be seen overcome with emotion.

Ballerini’s kicks off with this performance in Madison Square Garden Patterns Tour. She next has a show in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on January 21.

Kelsea Ballerini’s 2024 MSG setlist

“This time last year”
“Luggage”
“First Rodeo”
“How Much Do You Love Me”
“Two things”
“We broke up”
“To wait”
“Deep”
“Nothing really matters”
“Sorry mom”
‘Beg for your love’
“Cowboys Cry Too”
“I Would, Would You” (with “Lean On Me”)
“Did you come home?” (Outro)
‘Love me like you mean it’
“Peter Pan”
“Miss me more”
“Hole in the bottle”
“If You Go Down (I’m Going Down Too)”
“Mountain with a view”
“Blinded”
“Penthouse”
‘To the men who love women after heartbreak’