Grateful Dead, Bonnie Raitt Tribute

Shakedown Street meandered its way to the nation’s capital on Sunday (December 8), where counterculture and high art culture merged at the 47th Annual Kennedy Center Honors, which also featured legendary rockers the Grateful Dead Blues rock singer and guitarist Bonnie Raitt; famous film producer Francis Ford Coppola; jazz trumpeter, pianist and composer Arturo Sandoval were also selected.

This year’s honors began with the selection of Harlem’s famed Apollo Theater to celebrate the theater’s nine decades of supporting black artists and culture.

The evening continues to elevate its unique mix of celebrities, politicians and patrons of the arts — fun fact: former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi still has buttons from her late-’80s “Death” show — while the outgoing administration Out went all out. President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff received a lengthy ovation.

Music stars include Brandi Carlile, Sheryl Crow, Maggie Rogers, Dave Matthews, Queen Latifah, Leon Bridges, James Taylor, Emmy Lou Harris, Susan Tedeschi and Derek Trax, Don Worth, Sturgill Simpson, War and Treaties, Jackson Browne, Trombone Shorty, Doug E Fresh, Raye, Grace VanderWaal and Keb Mo.

Non-musical talents shine equally. Robert De Niro, Martin Scorsese, George Lucas, Al Pacino and Laurence Fishburne have all paid tribute to Coppola, while Letterman, Miles Teller and Chloe Sevage shared their personal connection to the deceased. Julia Louis Dreyfus celebrated Raitt, and Dave Chappelle paid a hilarious tribute to the Apollo.

Bonnie Raitt
Raitt has won 13 Grammy Awards, including Best Song in 2023, when her stirring “And Just Like That” beat out songs by the likes of Beyonce and Harry Styles. Raitt is known for her activism and her singing and Praised for his killer moves.

“As you get older and you reflect on how you got to where you are today, not just in your career but in life, I attribute a lot of that to Bonnie,” Crowe said in a pre-show interview with Billboard shared.

She recalls seeing Raitt perform for the first time and buying her first guitar the next day. “When you’re a 17-year-old girl and you play piano and you go see Bonnie Raitt and she’s performing and she’s the lead singer in a boy band and she’s singing the truth… I would never pick up a guitar and watch I can’t go out without her,” Crowe said.

Leiter’s work in social justice served as a north star for Carlile and many others. “I was lucky enough to have a long conversation with Bonnie about activism and how we work as musicians and artists,” she said on the red carpet.

“I was about 17, and I was at a Bonnie Raitt concert, and a ‘No Nukes’ guitar pick fell on the tip of my shoe, and I picked it up, and then I knew what she meant. I carry all her messages forward. The work she does for Aboriginal people, for women’s rights… she’s so outspoken and musically powerful and everything she says is backed up by a thunderstorm of conviction.

Accompanied by Crowe on piano, Carlile took the stage for a heartfelt rendition of “I Can’t Make You Love Me,” while Emmylou Harris and Dave Mathews stirred the heartstrings with their “Angel From Montgomery,” a song on which Leiter famously sang duet. Julia Louis-Dreyfus praised Leiter’s authenticity, noting, “You know it’s Bonnie. All red hair, no bullshit.” Jackson Browne, his friend of 50 years, noted Never stopping the urge to grow and expand myself and myself as an artist,” before crooning “Nick,” the title track from Raitt’s 1990 album, along with Crowe, James Taylor and Arnold McCuller of Time”, which won the Grammy Award for Album of the Year.

Arturo Sandoval
Sandoval, known for his fusion of Afro-Cuban, bebop and orthodox jazz, performed at a 1990 ceremony honoring his mentor Dizzy Gillespie. The night before the gala, he welcomed himself into the spotlight by hosting fellow honorees and other guests at a White House dinner with a poignant rendition of “God Bless America.” Well-wishers like Andy Garcia, Debbie Allen, Chris Botti and Cimafunk also returned the favor on stage.

The Cuban-born Garcia, who starred as Sandoval in the 2000 documentary “For Love or Country,” uses a personal narrative to describe Sandoval’s long list of accomplishments — which include four Grammy Awards, five Latin American Grammy Award and a Presidential Medal of Freedom: “He let me play in his band, but only if I brought a sandwich.”

Ellen described her relationship with Sandoval as a “lifelong creative marriage” that began at the Kennedy Center in 1996, with Botti describing Sandoval as a “trumpet master” who then incorporated his own trumpet style into Charlie’s ·In Chaplin’s exciting version of “Smile”.

Apollo
The Apollo was Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight, Luther Vandross and Lauryn Hill as a launch pad for artists like Lauryn Hill, while Quinn Latifah has taken audiences through decades of evolution.

Husband and wife duo War & Treaty performed a gorgeous medley of hits from Marvin Gaye and Tammy Terrell, while Savion Glover performed a rousing tap dance.

Comedian Chappelle has recounted the horrific experience of performing on an amateur night for the first time when he was 15 years old after winning a competition. It’s like I’m watching from outside my body,” he says, before becoming sincere. “My favorite part of freedom is art. The Apollo Theater is a church where we can talk to ourselves as ourselves.

Francis Ford Coppola
All in all, Coppola’s segment is legendary. The tribute to the five-time Oscar winner, whose credits include The Godfather Trilogy, Apocalypse Now, American Graffiti and Patton, features Hollywood heavyweight Robert De Niro, Al Pacino, Martin Scorsese, George Lucas and Laurence Fishburne.

Tributes were also paid by his sister Talia Shire, nephew Jason Schwartzman and granddaughter Gia Coppola, who appeared in Coppola Grace VanderWaal in the new film “Metropolis” performs a gritty, stirring rendition of “The Impossible Dream.”

With both sincerity and humor, Pacino points out that Coppola continues to break a cardinal rule of Hollywood: never invest in your own movies. “In Apocalypse Now, he built his house and had his wife and three kids in it. I know, I was there,” he quipped.

De Niro (the filmmaker’s character in “The Godfather Part II”) noted that he would not have had his career without Coppola, saying: “It’s not just me. Francis generously invites us all into his family, his world, and what beautiful, impossible dreams they are.

After sharing some amusing anecdotes, Scorsese compared his friend to the visionary pioneers of early cinema because “he reinvented, he had the same spirit as them and kept doing it, one at a time Again, film after film, decade after decade, he reinvented, always branching out into new territory.

the grateful dead
The Grateful Dead are still active at 60 years old, with original members Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann and Bobby Weir All attended the show, and the organic cultivation of community and live performance experience was nothing short of mythical.

“The Grateful Dead were a dance band, and people loved to dance, but at that time, there weren’t a lot of people dancing, so that’s where the community started and that’s where the music started,” Hart told Billboard. “We grew up with the music.”

Will breaks it down like this: “We had no plans, we had no schedule. We were just playing; that’s all we did. Our whole agenda was, let’s make more music.

Ahead of the show, Maggie Rogers shared how her 2019 experience working with Dead & Company at Madison Square Garden completely changed her touring schedule. “Before, I would play basically the same thing every night and there would be a beautiful meditation in that repetition, but since then I have my entire catalog taped to a refrigerator magnet on the bus and we have it every night They would create a new set list and they showed me what it was like to relax and take charge of my own musicianship.

Guitarist, songwriter and singer Jerry Garcia, who died in 1995, and bassist Phil Lesh, who died in October, were present throughout the evening. Lesh’s son Graham said before the show that his father was excited when he learned of the band’s induction, “It’s a great opportunity for the band to be able to connect with each other and revel in how great this is.” An honor. It’s amazing what they’ve accomplished.

Graham Lesh, part of a brilliant jam band that also included Don Was and Sturgill Simpson, electrified the venue with four songs Some people stood up. Rogers and Leon Bridges duetted on “Fire on the Mountain,” Simpson sang “Ripple,” Matthews and Tedeschi sang “Sugaree,” and then everyone came together for the show’s closing song, “Not Fade Away.” is a tribute to the band’s use of Buddy Holly for countless shows as an ode to enduring love.

Done+Dusted, in partnership with ROK Productions, serves as executive producer for the third year in a row. The special will air on December 22 on CBS and available on Paramount+.