See Stevie Wonder Dedicate ‘Stand Up to Cancer’ Performance to Aretha Franklin
Less than a month after Aretha Franklin succumbed to pancreatic cancer, her friend Stevie Wonder paid tribute to the Queen of Soul at Friday night’s Stand Up to Cancer telethon. Wonder’s performance can be viewed at the 56-minute mark of the above video.
“You know, I believe that if we just begin to love each other, across the nation and throughout the world, we will truly make love great again, because our love will find the cures to cancer and all the various things,” Wonder said prior to the performance, echoing a sentiment he shared a week earlier at Franklin’s funeral. “So let’s stand up to cancer and we will succeed.”
With a photograph of Franklin as a backdrop, Wonder performed a snippet of Jackie DeShannon’s classic “What the World Needs Now” that segued into Wonder’s own Songs in the Key of Life track “Love’s in Need of Love Today.”
Other performers at the 2018 Stand Up for Cancer special included Little Big Town and Charlie Wilson, himself a prostate cancer survivor. Matt Damon, Matthew McConaughey, Mahershala Ali, Reese Witherspoon, Jennifer Garner and Keith Urban were among the celebrities to present during the hour-long special, which can be seen below: