Stevie Wonder‘s Sing Your Song! As We Fix Our Nation’s Broken Heart tour couldn’t have come to North Carolina at a better time. While the tour was originally intended to fix the country’s fractured political divide ahead of the 2024 presidential election, a few weeks ago the Tar Heel State came in need of some serious mending.
Late last month, Hurricane Helene tore through the region, wreaking havoc on western North Carolina and causing the region’s worst flooding in over a century. As cleanup efforts continue around the hub of Asheville, 100-something miles away in Greensboro, Stevie Wonder brought his soulful music that has been healing physical, political, and racial divides in the United States since the 1960s.
Wonder’s history of healing in North Carolina goes back over 50 years, as he explained in a preamble before starting Thursday’s 27-song performance at the Greensboro Coliseum. On August 6th, 1973, the keyboardist was seriously injured in a car accident outside Salisbury that left him in a coma for four days and temporarily took his senses of taste and smell. Despite doctor’s orders, Wonder went on to perform at a benefit for Raleigh’s Shaw University in November of that year, raising over $10,000 for the school’s scholarship fund. Wonder’s gratitude hasn’t wavered in the intervening 51 years, as on Thursday he thanked the late surgeon Dr. Courtland Davis at the Winston-Salem hospital who saved his life.
“Everything we lose, God is going to bless us one thousand percent more,” the 25-time Grammy winner said to those affected by the hurricane during his pre-show remarks.
After introducing the story behind his latest single “Can We Fix Our Nation’s Broken Heart”, Wonder was joined onstage by probably the largest non-marching band this reporter has ever seen. Five horns, six singers, two additional keyboardists (including former Snarky Puppy member Cory Henry), two guitarists, two auxiliary percussionists, one drummer, one bassist who was the literal center of the bandstand, and a 12-person string section filled out the stage behind Wonder’s keyboard island. It was like having an entire recording studio onstage, and the result was a thundering force that shook your chest with its polyrhythms. The band’s prowess was on particular display when Wonder briefly left the stage mid-show, an interim highlighted by a pulsating performance of instrumental “Contusion”.
Stevie Wonder has been making #1 hits since he was 13, and his live performances are something akin to studying the hieroglyphics of R&B. Iconic songs from classic albums Hotter Than July, Innervisions, and Talking Book like “As If You Read My Mind”, “Master Blaster (Jammin’)”, and “Higher Ground” kicked off the show. Before going into “You Are the Sunshine of My Life”, Wonder lulled the packed arena with “You Are My Sunshine” in the most wholesome musical moment any of us are likely to witness. The classic nursery rhyme also previewed Wonder’s penchant for covering other artists, with songs by Michael Jackson, The Temptations, and Jean DuShon (with a bit of The Doors‘ “Light My Fire” snuck in) featured throughout the show.
Stevie Wonder — “Higher Ground” — 10/17/24
[Video: jacob ciccolella]
Stevie Wonder — “You Are My Sunshine” (Jimmie Davis), “You Are The Sunshine Of My Life” — 10/17/24
[Video: Spencer Wright]
At one point, Wonder introduced “I Was Made to Love Her” as a song he wrote when he was madly in love at 17. Many things have changed since then for the now 74-year-old singer, but he can still hit some of those same high notes. Audiences still hang on his every word, even between songs as he told stories and his fair share of blind jokes. Wonder’s charm and charisma are easily overshadowed by his generational musical talents, but in the live setting, you can’t help but fall under the spell of his magnetism. As an older woman sitting behind me remarked, “Now you know why he has ten kids.”
That genealogical prosperity perhaps reflects Wonder’s wider message, which he shared on Thursday: “Let’s make America love again.” Everywhere you look in Wonder’s vast catalog, there’s love. “Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours” which he wrote for his first wife, “Love’s in Need of Love Today”, “Isn’t She Lovely”, and of course “I Just Called to Say I Love You”, all carried that theme through Thursday’s show. Part of what has made Wonder’s music so timeless is that his message of love is a universal one we all need to hear—with a language we all understand.
As is the case in western North Carolina in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, the solution to fixing our nation’s broken heart will require neighbors to help neighbors and plenty of the love Wonder sings of. After all these years, decades, elections, and social upheavals, his songs still remain. They still make tens of thousands of people move their feet and clap their hands. Stevie Wonder still has that power, and he didn’t need any votes to get it.
Stevie Wonder — “Superstition” > “As” — 10/17/24
[Video: jacob ciccolella]
The Stevie Wonder tour continues through the end of the month with concerts across the Midwest. Find tickets and tour dates here. For information on how to help hurricane victims in western North Carolina click here.
Setlist: Stevie Wonder | Greensboro Coliseum | Greensboro, NC | 10/17/24
Set: Can We Fix Our Nation’s Broken Heart, As If You Read My Mind, Master Blaster (Jammin’), Higher Ground, You Are My Sunshine (Jimmie Davis), You Are the Sunshine of My Life, For Once in My Life (Jean Dushon) [1], I Was Made to Love Her, Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours, The Way You Do the Things You Do (The Temptations), I Can’t Help It (Michael Jackson), Ribbon in the Sky, Overjoyed, Contusion [2], Before I Let Go (Maze) [2], What’s Going On (Marvin Gaye) [2] [3], Don’t Forget (Cory Henry) [2], Don’t Worry ’bout a Thing, Love’s in Need of Love Today, Village Ghetto Land, Living for the City, Sir Duke, I Wish, Isn’t She Lovely, I Just Called to Say I Love You, Superstition, As [4]
[1] w/ “Light My Fire” (The Doors) snippet
[2] without Stevie
[3] Cory Henry piano instrumental
[4] Stevie gave fans the between “As”, “Another Star”, or “Do I Do”
The post Stevie Wonder Makes America Love Again On ‘Sing Your Song! As We Fix Our Nation’s Broken Heart’ Tour [Videos] appeared first on L4LM.
