Ed Sheeran brought both solid songs and plenty of spectacle to his headline show at Nashville’s Nissan Stadium on Saturday night (June 20). Spearheading the Loop Tour, this solo stadium show featured Sheeran constructing each song live using a loop pedal, highlighting both Sheeran’s energetic and entertaining showmanship and musical precision. The folk-pop star, known for writing his own songs, has used this approach to give fans a glimpse into the process of how he constructs his hits.
Instead of starting the show from the main stage, he wandered through the crowd shaking hands with audience members before holding court on the smaller B stage in the middle of the stadium. He launched into “You Need Me, I Don’t Need You” and “Sapphire.” Although he was single-handedly directing the show, the set also provided plenty of visual luxury. By the second song, he set off fireworks that colored the sky in shades of pink and dark blue, and fiery pyro was used that night. Thanks to a retractable bridge that extends above the audience, Sheeran was able to move back and forth between the main stage and the smaller B stage multiple times throughout the show.
He performed a set list of more than 30 songs, including performances of “Shape of You,” “Thinking Out Loud,” “Perfect” and “The A-Team,” but he also left room for improvisation, allowing fans to text song requests, and performing songs like “Dive” and “A Little More.”
During his set, Sheeran referred to Nashville as his “favorite city in America,” and talked about the several times he’s performed at Music City venues, including Nissan Stadium and Ryman Auditorium, as well as briefly living in Nashville over the past decade or so. His ties to Nashville include working with artists ranging from Luke Combs and Megan Moloney to Taylor Swift over the years, and he regularly appears at shows at more intimate Nashville venues such as The Bluebird Cafe, Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, and just last year he played a show with Noah Kahan at Santa’s Pub.
His shows featured everything from guest artists to quiet moments of introspection, love-filled ballads, and songs with infectious grooves that had fans jumping, cheering, dancing, and singing along at the top of their lungs. Below, Billboard highlights five of the best moments from Sheeran’s Nissan Stadium show.
The whole place sparkles
During his performance of “Camera,” Sheeran asked the audience for something special. After singing the lyrics, “I don’t need a camera to capture this moment,” he asked everyone in the audience to take a photo with their cellphone flash. The effect of tens of thousands of fans taking photos at once created a continuous sparkling effect, creating a special moment for the audience.
fiery peak
Throughout the set, Sheeran’s show was punctuated by pyro, fireworks, lights, and on-screen images and videos. But it all came to a powerful, dynamic peak with his final two songs (not an encore), “Bloodstream” and “I See Fire.” As he roared along to the two dramatic songs, increasing the intensity with new looped layers of vocals and rhythms, the stage was illuminated with red lights, pillars of flame shot skyward from every corner of the stadium and the main stage, and video images of molten lava and burning buildings added to the song’s drama.
unexpected collaboration
Midway through his set, Sheeran surprised the audience by welcoming country duo Dan + Shay on stage, eliciting cheers and screams from the crowd.
“I love this so much. We have such a deep history of just hanging out,” Sheeran said of his friendship with the duo, recalling that Sheeran first struck up a friendship with Dan + Shay’s Dan Smyers and Shay Mooney over a decade ago when they were living in Nashville.
Smyers also greeted the audience, calling Sheeran “one of the greatest singer-songwriters in the entire world,” before performing Dan and Shay’s Grammy Award-winning hit “Tequila.”
Irish folk collaboration
Dan and Shay weren’t the only collaborators Sheeran welcomed during his headlining show. Earlier in the evening, he welcomed Irish folk group Beoga, who joined in on a few songs.
“They’re going to play a gig at The Basement in Nashville on Monday. They’re going to play the songs they wrote on the first day of the meeting,” Sheeran said, recalling a songwriting session they had in 2016.
From there, the group performed and collaborated on several songs, including “Galway Girl” and “Nancy Mulligan.” Rhythmic slices of fiddle and jingling guitar had the audience on their feet, belting out the collaboration between two fan-favorites.
Fan requests create emotional moments on stage
As part of the Loop Tour, Sheeran allowed fans to request songs to include in his set each night. One of the most requested songs is the tear-jerking “Supermarket Flowers,” which Sheeran wrote for his album ÷ as a memorial to his late grandmother. The audience cheered as he began singing the song, and soon began singing along to lyrics such as “A broken heart is a loved heart.” Sheeran noted that the song was the number one request from fans, saying, “Maybe we should add it to the setlist.”
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