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Anyone walking past the Palmer House Hilton in downtown Chicago on July 10 would have had no idea that a concert was happening that night, let alone a concert featuring two artists with huge smash hits, and that’s the way Hilton wanted it, for their most recent @Play concert.

Sydney Sierota of Echosmith, which is comprised of four siblings, started off the night in a rare acoustic performance, accompanied by her dad and the manager of the group, Jeffrey David. Throughout the beginning of her set, most of the crowd seemed unentertained, more interested in drinking, conversing and Snapchat than the music, despite the obvious talent of Sierota’s vocals. As she interacted with the crowd more, even inviting up two crowd members to dance with her on stage during “Nothing’s Wrong,” the crowd became more engaged and sang along to the rest of the songs.

Sierota’s final song, “Cool Kids,” is the band’s biggest song to date, and is about the insecurities people feel, and which she said “everyone can relate to.” The song, which is off of their 2013 debut studio album “Talking Dreams,” reached number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100, and resulted in the entire crowd singing along. Even crowd members who were previously content chatting to the people next to him couldn’t deny the infectious chorus that they inevitably couldn’t escape when the song was a hit.

If the crowd was lackluster for the beginning of Sierota’s set, they were anything but for Andy Grammer, who burst out onto the stage, dancing and energetically singing throughout his set. Grammer played on of his biggest hits “Keep Your Head Up,” second, which had every person throughout the ballroom singing and dancing along. Grammer couldn’t help but comment on the immense energy felt throughout the room from the moment he took the stage, as he said “This is a relatively small room and it feels damn good in here.”

The talented multi-instrumentalist (who effortlessly played guitar, piano and trumpet in addition to singing) captivated the hearts of the crowd with his smooth voice (especially during “Honey I’m Good,” in which the crowd collectively lost their minds), and kept his fans engaged throughout the show with the help of his band, who all seemed to be best friends through their fun interactions on stage. Although they didn’t interact much throughout the show with the audience, the high intensity throughout the performance made it unnoticeable and led to an enjoyable performance, and one that I was honored to see.