Singer Andy Grammer brings positive vibes to Rohnert Park show

Top-selling pop singer Andy Grammer, known for such powerfully positive tunes as “Good to Be Alive (Hallelujah)” and “Don’t Give Up on Me,” doesn’t let it bother him when someone mocks his optimism.

“Part of trying to make people feel good is having some people tell you that you don’t know what you’re talking about,” Grammer said by phone from Los Angeles between rehearsals for his new concert tour.

That’s why he titled his fourth album, released in July, “Naive,” but his positivity stems not from sheltered innocence but from lessons learned during his early years as a street performer on the sidewalks of L.A.

“When you can go out with your guitar year after year for four years, knowing that no one is waiting to see you perform, you can do anything,” he said.

Things are different now, with Grammer’s “‘Don’t Give Up on Me’ Tour” dates scheduled in San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Chicago and New York, among other cities. Now people are definitely waiting to hear him sing his string of hits, half a dozen them certified gold.

Best of all for the singer’s Sonoma County fans, Grammer will perform Saturday, Sept. 6, at the Green Music Center in Rohnert Park.

Having shown the courage to share honest emotions in his music, the artist is encouraged by the response.

One of the video versions of Grammer’s current hit, “Don’t Give Up on Me,” features the Public School 22 Chorus on Staten Island in New York, recorded last April. He found the children’s singing so moving, it was struggle for him to finish the song.

“I didn’t really know how powerful that was going to be,” Grammer said. “The kids’ singing was great. We had to do four takes. On the first three, I was too blown away, but finally, on the fourth one, I didn’t cry.”

The video for “Good to Be Alive,” with Grammer cast as a parking valet, backed by a chorus of dancing parking lot colleagues, references the days before he began scoring hits.

“I had been a parking valet in L.A., so it was cathartic to that video,” he said.

Grammer, 35, released his first album, “Andy Grammer,” in 2011, and it yielded the singles “Keep Your Head Up” and “Fine by Me.” His breakthrough hit came with “Honey, I’m Good,” from his second album, “Magazines or Novels,” issued in 2015.

The song peaked at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, was certified triple-platinum and ranked among the 10 best-selling songs of 2015.

His third album, “The Good Parts,” came out in 2017 and generated three more singles.

And a stint on season 21 of the “Dancing with the Stars” in 2015 helped raised his profile, too.

The current album, “Naive,” gave fans not only “Don’t Give Up of Me” and “Good to Be Alive,” which is featured on the soundtrack for the film “Five Feet Apart,” but also “She’d Say,” which has a fascinating back story. The song is about Grammer’s mother, Kathy, who died in 2009.

“For my birthday, my wife got me a phone call from a medium,” Grammer recalled. “As to where I stand on the whole medium thing, I don’t know. But he said, “Your Mom’s here and she wants to write a song about what she’d say to your daughter.’”

Grammer thought it was a great idea for a song, so he wrote it, and his two-year-old daughter, Louisiana, appears in the video version, which also features the South African choral group Ladysmith Mambazo singing “I miss my mom and that’s what she’d say” in Zulu in the background.

“My mom liked the ‘Graceland’ album by Paul Simon, with Ladysmith Mambazo, and they happened to be in town that week when we were recording in Los Angeles,” Grammer said. “So they came in and sang.”

Now that Grammer has discovered the power of positive thinking and a lot of honest emotion, he’s anxious where that leads him next.

“I just try to be more and more sincere,” he said. “I want more and more to people to hear my songs and say, ‘Wow! That’s like me.’”

You can reach staff writer Dan Taylor at 707-521-5243 or dan.taylor@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @danarts.