Jason Mraz at 3olympia theatre Dublin on October 13th 2026

Human memory works wonders. When someone looks back at something they have experienced, they don’t judge it by its entirety. Instead, an experience is evaluated from its important moments. We remember snapshots or photographs, not movies. Researchers and psychologists who study this for a living say so. They call it the peak-end rule. You judge an experience by how it felt for you at its most intense point, and how it felt for you at the end.

Jason Mraz ended his spellbinding solo acoustic show on a warm, wholesome and mellow note. He made us all smile. He made us relax. He told us to breathe in deeply. To soak in all the goodness and joy the universe had to offer. To breathe out deeply. To let go of our worries, our stresses, the chatter in our brain that kept telling us all those stories that took us to places, in the past or in the future.

The present is a present, he said. Or maybe it was me. The entire show felt like a present from Mraz to a packed audience at the 3Olympia. “Breathe in. Smile. Breathe out. Smile” he said, many times over. All of us obliged. Who doesn’t want to smile? Who doesn’t want to breathe? Who doesn’t want to forget about life for a while?

Mraz wrapped the post-encore part of his show up by saying – “If someone asks you how the Jason Mraz show was, you can answer in all honesty and say it was…..breathtaking.” Watching and listening to music by Mraz has always lent a spring to my step. He’s that kind of artist and human being.

In my early 20s, I shared time with someone I once loved as we listened to ‘Clockwatching’ and ‘I’m yours’ on a loop. She and I sang together in harmony, both of us smiling in unison as we stretched out the syllables “yours” in the chorus of Mraz’s most popular song, for a loooooooong time until we ran out of breath. The silence in the aftermath filled us with a warm and contented sigh. And I was left with a goofy golden retriever grin on my face.

Many moons later, Mraz showed up on my TV thanks to Sesame Street. His song, “Let’s go outdoors” kept playing on loop along with “1,2,3,4” by Feist and “Don’t give up” by Bruno Mars, ensuring that when my child and I lived together, I did a good job of introducing her to wonderful artists in her early years.

I showed up at the concert with no expectations, other than to experience the kind of warm hug I felt each time I listened to ‘93 Million Miles’, ‘Curbside Prophet’, ‘Song for a Friend’ or ‘I Feel Like Dancing’. Mraz had a simple setup for his show.  A single mic on a stand. A kick-drum effects pedal. Four on-stage monitors. A static backdrop that reminded me of stained glass windows painted by Mark Chagall.

From the minute he walked on stage, smiled at an appreciative audience and began playing, he had us move through a range of emotions. Not that you need more evidence of the goodness and delight Mraz brings to people around him besides paying attention to his lyrics, though I’d be remiss if I didn’t tell you the story of Ben and Ellie.

Ellie was sitting next to me, and while waiting for Mraz we got talking. She had an all access pass. I asked her what her favourite thing about Jason was. “You know, he’s a really good person.”

“My husband Ben is part of his crew. They have all been together for more than ten years. They all work hard, enjoy the time they spend together. They’re like a tightly knit family and Jason holds them together like glue.”

Mraz showed us the importance of being earnest. Of being earnest with who we choose to be, how we choose to live and move through the world. I walked in expecting a memorable concert from an artist and a showman who’s been in the business for three decades. I didn’t expect to be so moved by the part philosophy, part guided meditation and part life lesson session that came on top of the wonderful music that Jason had in store for us.

I went through the full range of emotions – I was grooving and moving to keep pace all through ‘You Fckn Did It’, laughing my ass off when he sang ‘Don’t Get A Tattoo On Your Face’, ugly crying when he performed ‘Song For A Friend’ and I snapped back to reality when he performed ‘The Remedy (I Won’t Worry)’.

‘Don’t get a tattoo on your face’, a song I hope every human hears before they take impulsive decisions, had lyrics that had me nearly fall off my seat. “You can call the shots, it’s easy if you’re hot. You can grow your pubic hair, run naked in the wild. Please don’t compromise that pretty smile. A tattoo is a past you, that is hard to erase. Don’t get a tattoo on your face. This song was cowritten by your Mom, And sponsored by your in-laws, and every future boss.”

“My second favourite thing about Jason, and I just realised it”, said Ellie, as soon as the applause died down for this song, “is that he’s so funny!”  Everything starts with the written word. First there was the word, and all that. Jason Mraz gets it. He loves to write. He spoke of how we can process all our emotions – the agony, the ecstasy, our pride, our prejudice, our rise, our fall, and everything else – through the process of writing.

He said that even if you have nothing to write about – just write that down. Say – “I have nothing to say”. Then you’ve said something and gotten that out of your system.

Wait a bit longer. Keep waiting. If you still have nothing to say, keep saying that you have nothing to say. You will keep saying it for a bit longer until the pipes unclog. There is always goodness within you that’s willing to be let out with the right kind of situation and the right kind of stimulation. It is important to create those conditions.

Mraz said he didn’t remember the last time he was in Dublin. Someone in the crowd reminded him that it was in 2011. He said he remembered the first time he was in Dublin. That he got dumped that day, and that folks in Dublin helped him cheer up and get him through the turbulence that he experienced.

Musicians are like birds. There’s incredible diversity in the manner in which they express themselves, even if the starting points are similar – words may be written, notes may be arranged, instruments picked to fit the work of art that the musician is responsible for birthing, and then they let pieces of their soul float out into the vast river of creativity within the universe, in which we get to take a dip and immerse ourselves, and ride the wave of feelings and emotions to make us feel less alone in the trials and tribulations and trauma and triumphs that we navigate in our day to day.

My favourite parts of Jason Mraz’s show? When you were born, you took your first breath. You cried. And you took a shit. When you die, you will take your last breath. You might also end up shitting as one final act of bodily eviction as your life evicts itself from your body. In the space between the first and last breaths, between A to Z, lies everything.

Mr A-Z had choices that he used wisely. Through who he is and how he moves through the world, he helped fill up what went into that evening at 3Olympia from A to Z with his art, to create a space where he lifted us up and took us where we belong. It was truly breathtaking.