MANHATTAN — Bieber fever is spreading uptown on Monday night, with a special surprise performance scheduled for the historic Apollo Theater.
Teen sensation Justin Bieber announced the show via Twitter on Monday afternoon, noting that he would take the same stage where Michael Jackson performed in 1969 at the age of 9.
“We can announce....the secret show in NYC is at the famous APOLLO THEATRE in Harlem. where MJ once played with the Jackson 5!!” the Biebs tweeted.
Tickets for the show were given away at Macy’s in Herald Square on Monday, during a one-day-only promotion that awarded two tickets each to the first 500 customers who purchased $168 worth of Bieber’s new perfume, Girlfriend.
That pricey perfume package came with two fragrance sprays, a hair mist, a body lotion, a download card to access Bieber's new CD when it's released and VIP access to a private Justin Bieber performance on Monday night.
"I'm his biggest fan. He's my future husband," said 10-year-old Melannie Martinez after she picked up her perfume and her tickets on Monday afternoon. "I was freaking out to see him."
Martinez picked up a package of perfume along with her 9-year-old cousin, Khamila Cabral, courtesy of her mother, Olga Montano.
Montano said she came to the store just to purchase the perfume and had no idea the cost would be so high or that it would come with two tickets to Monday's concert.
"It just caught me by surprise," Montano said as the girls jumped up and down, Bieber packages in hand. "But they're happy."
Pilar Muhammad, 16, found out about the promotion via a tweet from Bieber earlier in the day and promptly emailed both her mother and her father.
"I'm so excited," Muhammed said, tickets in hand. "I ran around the house."
Muhammad, who lives just a few blocks from the Apollo, said she was planning to wear her Justin Bieber hoodie at Monday's performance, as well as a purple headband because purple is the color Bieber wears most.
"But no Uggs," she added. "Because he hates Uggs."
Muhammad's mother, Lisa Redd, said she acquiesced to the purchase and the performance on the condition that her daughter study for her upcoming Regents exam before the concert and that she work off some of the cost of the purchase price.
"She's crazy about Justin Bieber," Redd said. "I like the fact that he seems like a clean-cut performer."
Giuliana Castellano, 20, also found out about the promotion on Twitter and rushed from her Staten Island home to Macy's in Herald Square in time to snag some of the last tickets available.
Castellano, who is studying nursing at the College of Staten Island, said she spent the night in Rockefeller Center on Thursday to see Bieber perform on Friday's episode of "The Today Show," but she was still more than willing to shell out $168 for the perfume and the tickets.
"It's so worth it," Castellano said. "I would've paid $1,000."
Representatives at Macy's said tickets were close to sold out on Monday afternoon. The concert was set to begin at 7 p.m.
The Apollo Theater did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday.
