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Lauren Alaina shared a clip of an emotional moment on stage.
The country star, 31, said she “cried every night during this song when my momma came out to watch me.” Alaina performed “Little Things,” a song she wrote with Ross Copperman, Seth Ennis and Emily Falvey after listing her father, J.J. Suddeth, in July 2024. She teared up when she saw her mom standing at the side of the stage. “There’s just something about seeing her there that made me so emotional,” Alaina wrote in a caption on Instagram. “I just wanted her to hug me. Call your parents. Life is precious.”
“The loss of my father was unexpected and life shattering. When you have a loss of this magnitude, the little things in life start to matter a lot less,” Alaina said in a statement when she released the ballad in August 2025. “I will never forget the conversation I had with my brother on the way to the session I wrote this song. He said someone had complained to him about the cost of eggs. He said he just kept thinking to himself, 'My dad just died. I don't really care about the cost of eggs anymore.' It really struck me.
“I told him when something that really matters happens, your eyes are opened to what doesn’t,” she continued. “I told him I was going to write that song for us that day. I know our dad would be proud of us both.”
Alaina is part of the star-studded lineup of the 2026 iHeartCountry Festival, along with Luke Bryan, Kane Brown, Parker McCollum, Riley Green, Shaboozey, Dylan Scott, Russell Dickerson, Gretchen Wilson and Chase Matthew. iHeartRadio's Bobby Bones is returning as the event’s host. The show will take place on May 2 at Moody Center in Austin, Texas. Tickets to the show are available as of January 23. Fans across the country will be able to catch all the action as the 2026 iHeartCountry Festival will be broadcast live across iHeartCountry stations nationwide and the free iHeartRadio app on Saturday, May 2nd at 8pm ET/5pm PT (7pm CT).