Pearl Jam Gives 8-year-old Drumming Prodigy Jaxon Smith a Shout-Out in Calgary

Jaxon Smith became the Man of the Hour at Pearl Jam’s Calgary show earlier this week. You may recall the 8-year-old Albertan drummer making the media rounds in 2012 after posting his impressive drumming covers onto YouTube, including Pearl Jam’s “Mind Your Manners.”

On Monday night, the “Man of the Hour” rockers were performing at Calgary’s Saddledome when they took a pause to give a shout-out to Jaxon, who happened to be in the audience with his family. Lead singer Eddie Vedder got the pintsize boy’s family to lift him up to cheers from the audience.

“He’s just an unbelievable kick-a– drummer,” Vedder told the crowd, in a video posted on YouTube. “He’s an incredible drummer who was playing ‘Mind Your Manners’ on the TV when we saw him.”

The lead singer simply said he wanted to say “hi” to the little boy.

“In 20 years when we’re in the same place, we’ll open for your band,” Vedder quipped.

In fact, Pearl Jam also hung out with the mini-musician behind the scenes. Jaxon posted two photos on Twitter, one in which he was posing with bassist Jeff Ament (“Told Jax he loves his Mind Your Manners cover :)”) and another in which he was flanked by drummer Matt Cameron. “Matt spent 20 minutes w Jax,” he tweeted. “Gave him show sticks !!”

Jaxon learned to drum by watching concerts on television. His father told “The Today Show” last year that he started playing at the age of 2.

“I don’t know, I just feel really good at it. I practice every day,” Jaxon added. “I have like 30 years more of drumming and then I can be a hockey player.”