Ed Sheeran brought his Irish roadie on stage to play piano in New York

PJ Smith, take a bow.

Ed Sheeran is currently in the midst of what is a fairly mammoth world tour, with hundreds of thousands of people across the globe turning out in their droves to witness him in the flesh. Normally, it’s just Ed and a loop pedal on stage, but at some of his most recent gigs, Ed has been calling on the musical ability of a man who works as a carpenter on his set, an Irishman known as PJ Smith, to give him a hand. Because Ed can’t sing, play guitar, work the loop pedal and play the piano all at the same time, PJ has been taking to the stage to play piano on ‘How Would You Feel (Paean)’, a track from Ed’s most recent album, Divide. As he explains in the video below from a gig in Duluth in Minnesota in August, Ed only recently found out that PJ is an accomplished piano player and after initial reluctance on PJ’s part, he eventually agreed to show what he’s capable of in front of quite sizeable audiences. Not forgetting where he comes from, PJ has been representing Ireland by wearing an Irish soccer jersey on stage and surely it can only be a matter of time before he persuades Ed to perform ‘Put ‘Em Under Pressure’ and really put the crowd in the mood. Brian Caball was at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn to witness Ed and PJ in the flesh on Sunday night and grabbed some pictures, while you can see a brief clip of their duet from 3:39 in the video below. Fingers crossed audiences can look forward to PJ strutting his stuff in front of his home crowd when Ed returns to Ireland next year.