A public performance can conceal a very private reason for choosing the song.

A song chosen in public can be carrying something entirely private. The room hears a performance and the performer is doing something else: marking an anniversary, addressing an absence, keeping a promise nobody knows about. The public act is a shell around a personal one, and none of that is visible in the applause.

Assume more of this than you can see. People’s choices frequently have a second reason they are not explaining, at work as much as anywhere. When something matters to someone disproportionately, there is usually a story. You do not need to be told it, but assuming its existence makes you a considerably gentler audience.