Kennedy Center to Salute McCartney

Paul McCartney will be among five people to receive this year's Kennedy Center Honors, which recognize artists for their lifetime contributions to American culture through the performing arts. Actors Elizabeth Taylor, James Earl Jones and Chita Rivera, and Metropolitan Opera artistic director James Levine will also be honored.

The twenty-fifth annual honors will take place on December 7th at a State Department dinner in Washington, D.C., hosted by Secretary of State Colin Powell. On December 8th, the honorees will be celebrated at a gala performance in the Kennedy Center's Opera House, to be attended by President Bush and First Lady Laura Bush, as well as various artists. CBS will broadcast the event at a later date.

Announcing McCartney and Levine, Kennedy Center Chairman James A. Johnson described the musicians as deserving of the honor, "For the unique and extremely valuable contributions they have made to the cultural life of our nation" and described McCartney as "one of the most prolific and influential songwriters of our era."

Past musical honorees include Willie Nelson, Stevie Wonder, Chuck Berry and Quincy Jones.

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Song Stories

“Too Close”

Next | 1998

Next was formed in Minneapolis when the uncle of Terry "T-Low" and Raphael "Tweety" Brown, who was a gospel choir director, introduced the brothers to Robert Lavelle "R.L." Huggar. Sounds of Blackness singer Ann Nesby groomed the R&B group before handing them over to Naughty by Nature's KayGee, who wrote and produced "Too Close." The idea for the song was sparked "from a conversation we had with several girls at a nightclub," explained T-Low. "It's talking about the club scene, with guys getting out of hand and the female telling him to back up, asking, 'What are you doing?'" 

More Song Stories entries »

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