Classic Hits

Legendary folk singer and Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Joan Baez will be celebrated with a tribute concert in February, featuring Bonnie Raitt, Rage Against the Machine‘s Tom Morello, Hozier, Lucinda Williams and more.

The event, A Night to Honor Joan Baez, will take place Feb. 8 at Masonic Auditorium in San Francisco, with Baez expected to perform. Other artists on the bill include Emmylou Harris, Rosanne Cash, Margo Price, Joe Henry and Taj Mahal, with promises of surprise guests and additional performers to be announced.

The concert is a benefit for Sweet Relief Musicians Fund, which provides services and financial assistance for career musicians and music industry professionals.

“We’re beyond thrilled to celebrate 30 years of Sweet Relief while honoring the great Joan Baez and her amazing career,” Aric Steinberg, executive director at Sweet Relief Musicians Fund, shares. “Joan has supported our charity for many years, and it’s a privilege to honor her this year alongside so many incredible artists. It will be a night to remember and I’m so grateful to Joan and all of the performers who will help ensure that our music community continues to have Sweet Relief as a resource for emergency financial assistance.” 

Tickets for the concert go on sale Friday.

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In September, Madonna shared on Instagram that she was working with producer Stuart Price, with whom she co-produced her Grammy-winning 2005 album, Confessions on a Dance Floor. Now she says we might get some new music from her by next year.

Madonna wrote on Instagram, “Working on new music with Stuart Price. these past few months has been medicine for my SOUL.”

Then, apparently referring to the battles she’s had trying to get her biopic made, Madonna wrote, “Songwriting and making music is the one area where I don’t need to ask anyone for their permission.. i’m so excited to share it with you. Who wants to hear new music in 2025!”

Madonna’s most recent studio album was 2019’s Madame X.

In addition to working on the 10-million-selling Confessions on a Dance Floor, Price most recently served as musical director on her Celebration tour, which concluded earlier this year. He’d also filled that role on her 2001, 2004 and 2006 tours. In addition, he co-produced her live albums I’m Going to Tell You a Secret and The Confessions Tour. 

Regarding her biopic, Madonna revealed in November that Hollywood types have been trying to convince her to downsize the project, which she said she’s been working on for four years.

“No easy rides for me. I guess I should be grateful,” she wrote. “It forces me to think outside the box. I did not have a normal life. I cannot make this in the normal way.” She also asked fans if her life story should be a series or a feature film.

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With everyone talking about Bob Dylan and the upcoming movie A Complete Unknown, Julien’s Auctions is getting in on the interest, announcing a new auction of Dylan memorabilia in January.

Celebrating Bob Dylan: The Aronowitz Archive, T Bone Burnett & More will take place Jan. 18 at Nashville’s Music Hall of Fame and feature a whole host of collectibles, including an early draft of Dylan’s classic tune “Mr. Tambourine Man.” 

The typewritten lyrics come from the archive of the late music journalist Al Aronowitz and are expected to sell for between $400,000 and $600,000.

Other items from the Aronowitz archive include an early Dylan oil painting from 1968, a 1983 Fender Telecaster owned by Dylan and signed handwritten lyrics to “Blowin’ in the Wind.”

Also up for auction is a one-of-a-kind new recording of Dylan’s classic “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” produced by T Bone Burnett, expected to sell for between $400,000 and $600,000. 

“Hearing Bob Dylan sing ‘The Times They Are A-Changin’’ sixty years after he wrote it is a moving experience,” Burnett shares. “The times, have, in fact changed, and the listener can hear the gravity and the consequence of the sixty years of life that have passed since he first wrote and recorded the song.”

This isn’t the first time Burnett has sold a one-of-a-kind Dylan rerecording. In 2022 a similar recording of “Blowin’ In The Wind” sold at a private Christie’s auction for $1.8 million.

Items in the auction will be on display at the Music Hall of Fame from Dec. 18 through Jan. 17. Registration for the auction is open now.

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Legendary singer Paul Rodgers turns 75 on Tuesday.

Rodgers is best known for his work as the frontman of Free, which had a top-five hit with “All Right Now” in 1970, as well as the frontman of the supergroup Bad Company. 

Bad Company’s self-titled debut album, which celebrated its 50th anniversary in May, hit #1 thanks to such classic songs as “Can’t Get Enough of Your Love” and the title track. Rodgers told ABC Audio “it’s a very lovely feeling” knowing the songs on Bad Company have stood the test of time after 50 years, sharing, “When I listen back to it, I’m like, wow.”

After leaving Bad Company in 1982, Rodgers launched a successful solo career and also fronted the band The Law, featuring former Faces drummer Kenney Jones.

In 2004, Rodgers joined Queen’s Brian May and Roger Taylor for a TV performance, and soon the Queen members were asking him to join them on the road. The touring collaboration, under the name Queen + Paul Rodgers, kicked off in 2005. They even recorded an album together, The Cosmos Rocks, which was released in 2008. Rodgers left in 2009 to get back to his solo career.

In 2023, Rodgers released Midnight Rose, his first solo album in almost 25 years, and revealed to the world he had suffered a series of strokes starting in 2016 that nearly took away his ability to sing. He told ABC Audio making the album helped him with his recovery.

“Well, it feels like being born again, actually, it’s absolutely great,” Rodgers said. “I was sort of incapacitated. … And I had to take it step by step. And everything I did was like a progress, was a step in the right direction.” 

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Mariah Carey‘s “All I Want for Christmas Is You” tops the Billboard Hot 100 again, and that puts her within striking distance of breaking her own record.

The song has now been #1 on that chart for a total of 16 weeks. That matches the record she set in 1996 with “One Sweet Day,” her collab with Boyz II Men. For years it held the record for the longest-running #1 on the Hot 100 until it was tied in 2017 by “Despacito,” and then surpassed in 2019 by “Old Town Road” by Lil Nas X and Billy Ray Cyrus.

If the Christmas smash makes it to another week at #1, Mariah will then break her own record for having the longest-running #1 hit by a female artist. 

Nineteen weeks is still the mark to beat, though. Right now, “Old Town Road” and Shaboozey‘s “A Bar Song (Tipsy)” are each tied for the all-time record.

Mariah’s song first came out in 1994 but didn’t hit the top 10 until 2017, because it was never officially released as a single. However, by 2017 streaming had boosted the song into the chart and by 2018, it had reached the top five. It’s been #1 for at least two weeks a year since 2019.

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Steve Perry wants to help you get into the holiday spirit.

The former Journey frontman has just launched his very own holiday yule log on YouTube, featuring songs from his latest holiday album, The Season 3, with video of a roaring fire, surrounded by a Christmas tree and stockings.

Perry originally released The Season in 2021, then followed it up with a deluxe edition a year later.

The latest version of the album, which came out in November, features a total of 16 holiday tunes, six of which are new, including “Call Me Irresponsible,” featuring the singer’s late father, Ray Perry, “Jingle Bell Rock” and “Let It Snow.”

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John Lennon’s two sons, Julian Lennon and Sean Ono Lennon, spent some quality time together and gave the public a little peek at their evening.

Julian shared a trio of photos from their hangout at John Lennon’s apartment at The Dakota on Instagram, including one of him giving Sean a kiss on the head and another of Sean digging into some noodles surrounded by takeout containers.

“A Goodnight kiss for my brother, after spending the evening with him, having a lil dinner & chatting the night away, at The Dakota,” Julian wrote. “Something we rarely get to do…Thankful.”

Julian, 61, is Lennon’s son with his first wife, Cynthia, who the Beatle divorced in 1968. Sean, 49, is his son with wife Yoko Ono, who he married in 1969.

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Paul McCartney is getting into the holiday spirit.

The Beatles legend is currently on the U.K. leg of his Got Back tour, and while playing in Manchester he broke out his holiday tune “Wonderful Christmastime.”

Performing in front of a holiday-themed backdrop, McCartney performed the song for the first time since 2018 at the Co-Op Live on Saturday, where, according to Rolling Stone, he was joined by children from the You Should Be Dancing Theatre Academy. He then performed the song again during his Saturday night show.

McCartney shared photos of the concert, and the holiday-themed performance, on Instagram, writing, “Simply having a Wonderful Christmastime in Manchester! We’ve been travelling around the world and here we are up north again. It’s good to be back!“ 

And McCartney has a few more opportunities to sing the song before Christmas. He is set to wrap the tour with two nights at the O2 in London, Wednesday and Thursday.

Released in 1979, “Wonderful Christmastime” was recorded during the sessions for McCartney’s solo album McCartney II. The song peaked at #26 in the U.S. and was a top-10 hit in the U.K., Germany and other countries.

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REO Speedwagon frontman Kevin Cronin wants fans to know he didn’t want the band to end.

The group announced in September that after 2024 they would cease touring; in a new interview with Billboard, Cronin says ending the group wasn’t his decision.

“Never in my wildest dreams did I ever see this coming,” he told the mag. “I didn’t want to end REO Speedwagon. This is sad, and I would do anything in my power to continue (as) REO Speedwagon. I never quit the band; I never will quit the band. I just got outvoted and … have to stop calling it REO Speedwagon at the end of this year.”

The vote he’s referring to was between the three members with controlling interesting in REO Speedwagon — Cronin; founding member Neal Doughty, who retired from touring in 2023; and bassist Bruce Hall, who joined the band in 1977 and who hasn’t toured with them since November 2023.  

Cronin is also upset Hall made comments on social media suggesting he was responsible for the end of the band. 

“It’s kind of like a divorce of sorts and during a divorce things get a little muddy and things get a little sticky,” he says. “It’s never thrilling when things are said that are inaccurate and hurtful.”

He adds, “My hope is that there will come a time where the dust will have settled. My intention is to ask forgiveness for anything that I’ve done or any hurt that I have caused Bruce. I don’t like to have grudges with people. I like to forgive and be forgiven.”

REO Speedwagon plays their final show Dec. 21 in Las Vegas. Cronin will head out on the Brotherhood of Rock tour with Styx starting May 28 in Greenville, South Carolina.

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AC/DC’s Brian Johnson makes a surprise appearance in a special holiday edition of Apple TV+ and Apple Music’s Carpool Karaoke.

A Carpool Karaoke Christmas, with Zane Lowe behind the wheel instead of James Corden, focuses on three pop stars — Lady Gaga, Dua Lipa and Chappell Roan. Johnson turns up during Gaga’s segment.

“You know what, I got you something for Christmas,” Lowe says, before stopping and picking up Johnson, which comes as a complete surprise to Gaga. 

The rocker then takes over behind the wheel, with Lowe asking, “You guys ready to rock?” Johnson responds to Gaga, “You were born ready.”

That leads to them all singing AC/DC’s classic “Highway to Hell.” At one point Johnson takes his hands off the wheel, shocking Gaga, who jokes, “We’re all gonna die and go to hell.”

Gaga then reveals a special connection she has to AC/DC, sharing that she was an extra in their “Stiff Upper Lip” video when she was 17. 

“I was head banging and they were like, ‘Um, don’t head bang, we want it to be modern,’” Gaga says, “and I was like, ‘No, there’s only one move that I can do.’”

Johnson ends his ride by wishing Gaga a Merry Christmas and joking, “I should have told you I don’t have a license.”

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