Fly Me to the Moon…
Tony Bennett born August 3, 1926, gave a master class in creative aging, last night at Radio City Music Hall. As his family had announced in an AARP Magazine article, in February of 2021, that he had received a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease, it was also a master class in using the arts to best navigate dementia.
Here are highlights from the concert in no particular order:
Lady Gaga coming into the audience, to sing to her parents and sister, kissing her father’s cheek and thanking her sister for the exquisite gown she had made. The gown was a tight fitting black and white number, which added flair, to her rendition of “La Vie en Rose,” made famous by Edith Piaf.
Throughout the concert the care, gentleness and love Lady Gaga showed Mr. Bennett, was palpable. She also repeatedly told the audience how much she loved us. At one point saying, “From where I stand, you are beautiful.” Which elicited an audience member to shout out, “We were born this way!” Which made her laugh and say, “Well we have that in common.”
Singing “Happy Birthday,” with 5,000 people to Tony Bennett as led by Lady Gaga to help celebrate his 95th birthday, was an honor.
She commanded the stage with her singing, dancing and wit and when it came time to bring out Tony Bennett, she said you can’t introduce him with just words, you have to sing it and then launched into “New York, New York,” which drove the audience nuts, singing, dancing, and clapping along.
The curtain dropped and when it lifted there was Tony Bennett. From then on almost every song ended with a standing ovation. His voice strong and powerful. He went through his hits including, “One for My Baby (and One More for the Road),” “The Very Thought of You,” and “The Good Life,” to mention just a few.
As a person who has worked with people living with dementia, I was attuned to see if there was any indication of dementia. Only a couple of times, the piano player spoke to Mr. Bennett after a song ended to keep him on stage and singing. Lady Gaga was proactive often saying things like, why don’t you start this one.
When they improvised the jazz style known as scat singing, which the voice is used in imitation of an instrument it was pure magic.
Throughout the show you could say there was no Alzheimer’s present. That is the remarkable power of the arts and especially music, to allow a person to remain present and in the moment even in fairly late-stage dementia.
I will link to the AARP article in the comments below. It has a well-produced video, with Mr. Bennett and his family talking about their decision to make his diagnosis public. It is a powerful and well written piece which includes links and tips for people living with dementia.
For me the absolute highlight was hearing, “Fly Me to the Moon,” live! As Bennett began each song, I listened closely to the sound to see if it was “my” song. As I wrote in yesterday’s post, I have a strong emotional connect to “Fly Me to the Moon,” due to Norman singing it hundreds of times over the years I worked with him.
Suddenly, I heard the familiar piano cords and the magic opening words that Bennett, but not others including Frank Sinatra start “Fly Me to the Moon,” with…
“Poets often use many words
To say a simple thing
It takes thought and time and rhyme
To make a poem sing
With music and words, I've been playing
For you I have written a song
To make sure you know what I'm saying
I'll translate as I go along....”
I leapt out of my seat cheering wildly, the only person out of 5,000 to do so! A minute later as Bennett, sang the lyrics, “Fly Me to the Moon…” the audience exploded and gave him a standing ovation again.