This time, ROSÉ and Bruno Mars met up somewhere much bigger than an “APT.,” joining forces at SoFi Stadium for a surprise performance of their hit single during BLACKPINK‘s run of DEADLINE World Tour shows in Los Angeles.
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In clips captured at the Sunday (July 13) show, the crowd of BLINKs goes absolutely wild when the Silk Sonic star appears and joins his duet partner on stage. Wearing matching jackets, Mars and the New Zealand-born K-pop star jump up and down while singing the lyrics to their smash hit “APT.,” accompanied by a fleet of backup dancers.
At one point, the two performers share a hug while harmonizing. As confetti rains down, fans in the audience scream-sing along to every word.
ROSÉ typically performs “APT.” during her solo portion of the DEADLINE World Tour setlist, but this marks the first time Mars has accompanied her for the song on the trek. After the pair dropped the track last October, it reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and spent 12 weeks atop the Billboard Global 200.
Sunday’s show marked the second of two back-to-back BLACKPINK concerts in L.A. After spending about a year apart to focus on solo projects, the band reunited earlier in July to kick off their DEADLINE trek with two shows in Goyang, South Korea. ROSÉ and bandmates LISA, JENNIE and JISOO will now spend the next six months touring on and off through North America, Asia and Europe.
Prior to resuming full-band activities, ROSÉ released her Billboard 200 No. 3 debut solo album, Rosie — on which “APT.” appears — in December. Of working with Mars for the project, the Australia-raised star told The Cut in February that she learned a lot about trusting herself and not rushing the songwriting process from the veteran pop superstar.
“I’d always feel like, ‘It’s my fault, I should have an idea by this time,’ or, ‘Maybe I’m just not good enough,’” she told the publication at the time. “Bruno showed me that, as a creative, you have to listen to your intuition and your timing, and you’re allowed to trust in it. I’ve become more confident in what feels right to me and in doing whatever it takes to have that come to life.”
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-07-14 15:46:042025-07-14 15:46:04Watch Bruno Mars Crash BLACKPINK’s DEADLINE Tour for Surprise ‘APT.’ Performance With ROSÉ
Long before 2025 even kicked off, many artists were already starting to tease fans, hinting or downright saying they should expect new music in the upcoming year.
Take The Weeknd, for example. The artist born Abel Tesfaye began teasing his fans on Jan. 7, 2024, via social media. In an Instagram carousel, he shared the covers for After Hours and Dawn FM, followed by a black square with a giant white question mark in the center and a tiny parental advisory sticker in the bottom left. His caption? A single “3.” He finally revealed the title of the final album of his trilogy — Hurry Up Tomorrow — in September, and the day before Thanksgiving, shared its release date. But on Jan. 13, the musician announced that due to the deadly Los Angeles area wildfires, he was canceling his Jan. 25 Rose Bowl concert, and also delaying his album out of respect and concern for those in the impacted areas.
Then there was Lady Gaga. Mother Monster surprised the Little Monsters with a simple message at the end of the Gaga Chromatica Ballconcert film, confirming that her seventh album is indeed in the works: “LG7 GAGA RETURNS.” But the tease, which debuted on the HBO Max film in late May, did not offer any hints as to when the highly anticipated release would arrive. It wasn’t until her September Vogue cover story that Gaga revealed LG7 would arrive sometime in February 2025. Mayhem would eventually drop on March 7.
And of course, things don’t always go as planned. Joe Jonas announced in July 2024 that his new solo album, Music for People Who Believe in Love, would arrive Oct. 18, then shared in a September X post that the set “is gonna come out later now” because he wanted to add some “final touches.” (It arrived May 23.)
With surprise album news, moving release dates and the sheer number of album announcements, it can be hard to stay on top of when new music by favorite artists is arriving. To help make sure fans don’t miss out on big arrivals, Billboard‘s calendar of 2025 new album releases — which will include the most notable releases from artists across genres, spanning hip-hop, K-pop, Latin, rock, pop, country and more — will be updated regularly as new music is announced.
The calendar is organized chronologically by month and week, and includes a section for albums that artists have announced, but have not given an exact release date.
Keep checking back for the latest 2025 album release dates!
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Getting up to do morning TV is always a struggle for rock stars who are used to late nights and mid-day wake-ups. But you’d expect that the TV professionals who are used to the routine of going into work when it’s still dark out would have it down.
At least that’s what “Jessie’s Girl” singer Rick Springfield seemed to think when he dropped by the third hour of the Today show on Friday (July 11) to chat up hosts Al Roker, Craig Melvin and Jill Martin about his upcoming I Want My 80s package tour with John Waite, Wang Chung, Paul Young and John Cafferty, slated to kick off on Friday (July 18).
Asked by Roker if he ever imagined that his signature hit “Jessie’s Girl” would still be spinning four decades later, Springfield humbly said the song had “taken on a life of its own,” stopping his thought midway when he appeared to notice co-host Melvin yawning during his answer.
“Am I boring you?” Springfield said with a smile as he reached over to playfully shake Melvin’s leg. “No, no, actually you’re not at all, I apologize,” Melvin laughed as Roker and Martin cracked up at their compatriot’s morning TV faux pas. “It’s early, don’t worry about it. I’ll yawn too,” Springfield said with a chuckle as Melvin suffered through a coughing fit.
Springfield showed what a good sport he was after the incident, posting a pic with the three co-hosts with the message, “Had a fun time with the gang at @todayshow this morning!”
The Australian-born star said he was fans of all of the bands on the bill in the 1980s, when he went from playing a hunky doctor on the daytime soap General Hospital to scoring a string of pop radio hits from his fifth studio album, 1981’s Working Class Dog. “And they’re all great people, too, so it’s a great hang backstage,” he said, fessing up to the fact that the debauchery of the old days has been replaced by nice meals and proper sleep.
The singer also talked about the futile search for the real “Jessie’s Girl,” the head injury he suffered during a Las Vegas gig in 2000 that left him with brain damage, as well as his upcoming role in Ryan Murphy’s fall series All’s Fair, in which he’ll co-star alongside Glenn Close, Naomi Watts, Kim Kardashian, Teyana Taylor, Sarah Paulson and Niecy Nash.
Check out the interview below (yawning bit begins around 1:42 mark):
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Crafting a debut album is already a daunting task, one that gets more difficult when you enter the entertainment world as a child star whose successes never quite culminated in an indisputable mainstream breakthrough. For Josh Levi, a 26-year-old Houstonian looking to be R&B’s next song-and-dance heartthrob, that journey is intimately familiar, which only makes him more excited to unleash Hydraulic, his debut studio album, upon the world.
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“I was watching a TikTok the other day, and someone called me an underground artist. I guess I am that, but I definitely have been working for a long time — since [I was] nine years old — in the studio, being an artist and doing music videos,” he tells Billboard the day after debuting the music video for his new “Don’t Go” single. “I love the headspace that I’m in today of focusing on my journey, telling my story and being as authentic as I can be. This album really does reflect my journey in a lot of ways without alienating the people who are just now getting to know me. You can really get a sense of what I stand for and where I’m coming from, while getting to know me for the first time.”
From making his television debut in 2009 on Friday Night Lights to reaching the finals on season three of The X Factor USA in 2013, Josh Levi has been percolating through the industry for several years. After a few years of putting out music and covering songs on YouTube, Levi joined Citizen Four, a boyband at Island Records, for a brief stint in 2017; he followed that up with a few guest appearances on Nickelodeon before earning his bachelor’s degree in business and finance from Florida’s Full Sail University in 2019. That same year, he joined forces with his current manager, Cooper Wilson, who knew Levi from his teenage YouTube days. They reconnected at a benefit concert right before the pandemic — and right after Levi had fired his then-manager.
By 2021, Levi signed with Raedio, Issa Rae’s record label, and Atlantic, giving way to his 2022 Disc Two project — a follow-up to his 2020 Disc One debut EP — and its 2023 Scratched Up expansion. As Disco Two delighted R&B heads, Levi made his Billboard Hot 100 debut as a part of 4*TOWN, the fictional boy band from Pixar’s Oscar-nominated animated film Turning Red. Peaking at No. 49, the Billie Eilish- and Finneas-written “Nobody Like U” also scored a Grammy nomination.
Out August 15, Hydraulic isn’t merely a debut LP; it’s the progeny of one of Gen Z’s most well-studied R&B students. Trading on crisp layered harmonies from the school of Brandy and the chilly electronic music influences of Looking 4 Myself-era Usher, Hydraulic finds Levi pouring his lifelong journey to stardom into a set that rides life’s emotions like the H-Town-certified car hydraulics that inspired the set’s title. From the Destiny’s Child-interpolating “Don’t Go” to myriad chopped-and-screwed influences, Levi’s hometown isn’t just his muse, it’s his bedrock for how he understands himself and his artistry at this juncture of his career.
“I was very passionate about not creating a love album or a heartbreak album or a club album or a moody album,” he muses. “I really wanted to create something that could represent different parts and moments and times of people’s lives so that you can get lost in this album.”
In a revelatory conversation with Billboard, Josh Levi talks about clearing “Don’t Go” with Destiny’s Child, crafting Hydraulic over the past few years, his all-time favorite ad-libs, and why Cécred is a mainstay in his haircare routine.
What are some of your earliest musical memories?
I grew up singing in church. [I remember] getting in trouble for getting away from my mom and my dad and trying to go up on stage. Eventually, I made it to the choir really, really young. I remember writing a song for my sister’s kindergarten graduation, [and] recording my first song in a studio in downtown Houston that smelled like weed when I was nine years old.
You gotta explain this studio session.
It was hilarious. I didn’t know what that was, but I didn’t like the smell. I mean, I still don’t. [Laughs]. It was hella people in the studio. I was so young; it did feel like I should not have been there, but my mom was with me, which was really good because I was literally nine!
I was recording this song called “Favorite Girl,” [which] actually still sounds like my album. It still has vocal layers and harmonies like how I be doing in my songs now. When I listen to that song, it’s still edgy and dark and in the same sonic world that I’m in today. It’s not this bubblegum, kiddie song. It’s very mature. I remember doing takes over and over, not knowing what I was doing, but just figuring out my tone. It was a day that I’ll never forget; I still have footage from it!
What’s the first song you remember being stuck in your head?
Probably “Shackles” by Mary Mary. The first non-gospel song I remember is “Lions, Tigers & Bears” by Jazmine Sullivan.
So you’ve just been an R&B head your whole life?
I guess you could say that. My dad and my mom didn’t really have a [specific] taste in pop culture. Every now and then, my dad would call me downstairs to watch YouTube, like, “Joshua, come watch this Jazmine Sullivan!” or “Joshua, come watch this Boyz II Men!” And then it was like Whitney Houston, Michael Jackson, etc.
When did you start working on Hydraulic?
They say you spend your whole life making your first album, so I feel like I spent a long time getting to this point. The oldest song on the album is maybe three or four years old, but there are also songs that I’ve done in the last couple of months. I never really went into the studio and the making of this album, until recently, [with the mindset of] “I am making a debut album.” I can’t think that way; it will drive me crazy. I went into this process seeing how I could tell my story and make music that sounds like Josh Levi as much as possible. But the concept of Hydraulic came to me around Thanksgiving last year.
Who were you working with in the studio? How did you guys build out the album’s soundscape?
I worked with Mariel Gomerez on this album, who is my A&R and a master at working with artists that are trying to push genres forward and break boundaries. Her main other artist that she works with is Beyoncé; she’s responsible for helping her craft so many genre-bending, revolutionary albums between Renaissance and Cowboy Carter and Act III and Lemonade. [Gomerez] was someone [who] really helped me lean into my daringness as an artist. And that has been one of the biggest challenges of being in music since I was a kid. From day one, people were telling me what I should be more of and less of, and it was never what I wanted to do.
“You should be more commercial, you should be more like Usher, you should be more like Chris [Brown], you should be more street, you should be more clean, you should be more pop” — I’ve heard every single thing since I was a kid. One of the coolest things about working with Mariel is that she was one of the first people [who] said, “You should be more like Josh Levi.” So she partnered me with people that brought that out, like London on da Track, Poo Bear, BEAM, Deputy, MNEK, Camper and Koshy.
How did “Don’t Go” come together?
I’ve never sampled or interpolated anything, so when I made “Don’t Go,” I went to the studio that day, intentionally being like, “Why am I doing everything from scratch all the time?” There’s so many artists that interpolate songs that I really love, and I don’t know why I haven’t done that yet. I have a playlist of songs I’d love to sample, and “No, No, No Pt. 2” was on there.
I’ve always loved Destiny’s Child. I grew up going to Music World, which was Mathew Knowles’ record label in Houston, all the time. There were posters of Destiny’s Child everywhere, House of Deréon too, and I remembered thinking, “Who are these brown-skinned models?” Then, I quickly got caught up and lost in the Destiny’s Child lore, so that song has always spoken to me. I worked with Trey Campbell and Tony Jones on this record; we came up with the idea, and I tried to make it feel less percussive and as bass-driven and as Houston as possible.
I definitely had to ask permission from all the people [who] were a part of the song. I guess they saw the vision and respected my version of it. It means a lot because you can never really guarantee that the original writers and performers of a song will rock with the way that you made your own. But to say Destiny’s Child gave me the green light is amazing. I take that with pride. I want to make them proud.
What was it like working with Sean Bankhead for the music video? Why is it important for you to keep dance at the forefront of R&B?
I’ve always wanted to bring energy to R&B. I also grew up dancing competitively, so that’s always been a part of who I am. I want to dance. I want to compete. I want to add something different. My favorite artists weren’t the ones that just were standing there; they were moving around — Michael Jackson, Beyoncé, Aaliyah, Missy Elliott, even Brandy used to dance a lot in certain eras. I think it’s something special about giving people a reason to get up, grab a partner and two-step.
I’ve also known Sean forever, so it was one of those things where you know and respect your homie, but you’ve never actually collaborated. “Don’t Go” felt like a really cool moment to do something with him specifically. He’s a master of his craft and no stranger to getting people moving. We both wanted to do something with each other that we’ve never done, and I think we did just that.
You love a good ad-lib. What do you understand the function of an ad-lib to be in R&B? Who are your favorite vocalists in that lane?
An ad-lib should be obnoxious — sometimes — but tasteful. Just hitting the right spot like seasonings on your favorite meal. I say “obnoxious” because a lot of my favorite ad-libs are like, “Did you have to do that much?” No, but that’s why we’re obsessed.
When it comes to ad-libs, I love Brandy for sure, Joe has some of my favorite ad-libs, Boyz II Men on “Water Runs Dry,” specifically. Beyoncé has crazy ad-libs; they’re famous on their own. The Dubai [“Drunk in Love”] riff is crazy, the original “Crazy in Love” riff, the ad-libs in “I Care.” That’s what makes music fun: Giving people an opportunity to choose something that they’re obsessed with in a song outside of the lyrics or the melody. You can really plant things inside music for different people to connect with.
You signed with Raedio and Atlantic in 2021. How do you find that you’ve grown personally and professionally since then?
My mental health has grown a lot in those years of being signed. I can say that being signed to a major label and being an artist and putting yourself out there and the business and numbers of it all can be very difficult to do every day. It’s hard to see yourself as a product or something that always has to sell something. That’s not something that necessarily comes naturally to me. I fell in love with music for the art and sharing the gift of it all.
But that ain’t what it’s all about. I’ve really grown mentally in terms of figuring out a system that allows me to feel like I’m sharing my gifts while understanding how to be a businessman. That’s something that my degree has also taught me. I’m really ambitious, and I know that I can’t be selling out arenas and stadiums one day unless I understand how to really connect with people, and I feel like I understand how to share myself better. I’m still learning.
How was your time on the FLO tour?
I don’t always reach this goal, but I really want to do things with people that I’m a fan of. Going on tour with a group of women that I actually am a fan of and respect was really cool. I knew their songs and vice versa, which was beautiful. There’s no better feeling than it being a mutual thing. I’ve been watching Love Island, and sometimes they can’t tell when it’s really mutual.
They were like, “We’re loving your new single, ‘Feel the Bass,’ how’d you feel about coming on tour starting in Houston and staying on for some dates?” I was just like, “When you guys speak in those accents, I can’t even say no!” They also had a studio on their bus, so I played them some songs from my album, and I heard some of their unreleased stuff, and we were like, “Hm, FLO x Josh Levi … maybe there’s something there!”
The braids are always on point. What’s your hair care routine?
I do be using Cécred. I got to sit in the Cécred chair in Cécred Salon actually. The Queen herself allowed me to be a part of the Cécred experience. I actually really do love her products. I get my hair styled every week. But in between getting braids, I try my best to take care of it because it’s super thick and there’s a lot of it. It’s like a full-time job. I don’t know how women do it!
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Morat has signed an exclusive management agreement with WK Entertainment in partnership with HYBE Latin America, Billboard can exclusively announce today (July 14).
The Colombian pop-rock band, composed of Juan Pablo Villamil, Simón Vargas, Juan Pablo Isaza and Martín Vargas, joins Walter Kolm’s (WK Entertainment’s CEO and founder) prolific roster that includes Carlos Vives, Emilia, Prince Royce, Wisin and Xavi, to name a few.
“Morat is one of the most consistent and respected bands in Latin music today,” Kolm said in a press statement. “We’re thrilled to work together and support their next chapter with a global strategy that matches their ambitions.”
Isaac Lee, chairman and CEO of HYBE Americas added: “This partnership with Morat reflects our conviction in the power of Spanish-language music as a global force. Morat is one of the most influential bands of their generation, and their incorporation into HYBE Latin America aligns with Bang Si-Hyuk’s vision of building a truly global ecosystem for superstar development. We are honored to be in business with Walter Kolm.”
The news of the signing comes on the heels of Morat’s headlining show at the SummerStage festival in Central Park during the 2025 Latin Alternative Music Conference (LAMC) in New York.
The Bogotá-based group kicked off their career more than 10 years ago and first achieved international success in 2015 with “Mi Nuevo Vicio” in collaboration with Paulina Rubio. They are currently making the rounds with their fifth studio album Ya Es Mañana (YEM) — one of Billboard’s Best Latin Albums of 2025 (So Far) — and home to their Camilo-assisted “Me Toca a Mi,” which peaked at No. 5 on Latin Pop Airplay this April. Morat is also on their Asuntos Pendientes 2025 tour that started this May in Mexico.
“This partnership with WK comes at the perfect time. We have so much happening with the album and tour, and we’re excited to have their team help us take it even further,” the band noted.
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Olivia Rodrigo is speaking up about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
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In a message posted to her Instagram Story over the weekend, the pop star shared her thoughts on the “horrific and completely unacceptable” conditions families in Palestine have been facing for nearly two years. Hunger and homelessness have run rampant in Gaza since Hamas killed 1,200 Israelis and took 251 more as hostages on Oct. 7, 2023, after which Israel launched a war on the terrorist group that has resulted in the deaths of more than 58,000 people, according to Reuters.
“there are no words to describe the heartbreak I feel witnessing the devastation that is being inflicted upon innocent people in Palestine,” Rodrigo began. “mothers, fathers and children in Gaza are starving, dehydrated and being denied access to basic medical care and humanitarian aid.”
“there is no child in Israel, Palestine or anywhere in the world who deserves to suffer through what we’re seeing these children have to endure,” she continued. “it is horrific and completely unacceptable. to give up on them is to give up on our shared humanity.”
The Grammy winner went on to share that she has donated to Unicef to “help support the victims of this horrifying situation,” adding that she encourages followers “to do the same if you have the means.”
Rodrigo is just the latest artist to speak up about the violence in Gaza. In recent weeks, Lana Del Rey has said that she prays for Palestine “every day,” while Billie Eilish disavowed Israel’s plan to forcibly relocate about 2 million Palestinians to a “humanitarian city” built on the ruins of Rafah, calling the concept “horrifying.”
The High School Musical: The Musical: The Series alum has also long been outspoken when it comes to her beliefs, from endorsing Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election to using her shows to protest attacks on reproductive freedom. In February last year, Rodrigo launched her Fund 4 Good, which raises money for abortion funds across the globe — an undertaking that led Planned Parenthood to honor her with a Catalyst for Change award at the organization’s spring gala in April.
“We live in a world that politicizes our bodies and uses harmful ideologies to deny us safety and healthcare,” Rodrigo said during her speech at the event. “My greatest wish is that through organizations like Planned Parenthood and the action of everyday citizens, no woman will need to sacrifice her dreams, her health or humanity because of restrictive laws or lack of resources.”
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This week’s crop of new music features a disco-dipped, R&B-leaning collab from Miranda Lambert and Chris Stapleton, a freewheeling collab from Marcus King Band with Jamey Johnson and Kaitlin Butts, and a slate of musical anthems from Greylan James, Sunny Sweeney, Ashby Frank and 2 Lane Summer.
Check out all of these and more in Billboard‘s roundup of some of the best country, bluegrass and/or Americana songs of the week below.
Chris Stapleton & Miranda Lambert, “A Song to Sing”
Two of country music’s most distinct voices entwine for the first time on record, trading verses in a disco-inflected reverie, as they each sing of lasting love and commitment with their respective partners, even through life’s vicissitudes. Though they’ve collaborated before (Lambert co-wrote the aching “What Am I Gonna Do” from Stapleton’s Higher), this marks their first true duet. Swelling Wurlitzer, honeyed strings, and laid-back percussion weave together with their emotive harmonies, detailing an enthralling love that runs as deep in the heart as any heart-wrenching song.
Greylan James, “Water at a Wedding”
James, whose pen helped shape hits like Jordan Davis’ “Next Thing You Know,” continues affirming his place not just as a songwriter, but as a worthy vocalist and storyteller in his own right. His latest unspools a bittersweet scene of watching an old flame marry someone else. In the midst of the celebratory scene, he notices a detail most attendees overlook, one that hints that not everything is as joyous as it seems. The polished, pop-country track builds to a bridge that James delivers with quiet force and precision, again cementing his gift for crafting songs that are both relatable and head-turning.
Sunny Sweeney, “Traveling On”
Texas native and singer-songwriter Sunny Sweeney returns with a striking new track from her upcoming August release, Rhinestone Requiem. Co-written with Brennen Leigh, the song captures the emotional tug-of-war of freeing oneself from a toxic romance. A rustic blend of fiddle, pedal steel and acoustic guitar swirls around Sweeney’s nimble, twang-laced vocals, which brim with hard-earned sense of resolve. “Those blue eyes will no longer have control over me,” she declares, fashioning a slice of musical evidence that strength can — and does — triumph over heartache.
Marcus King with Jamey Johnson and Kaitlin Butts, “Here Today”
Ahead of new album Darling Blue, the Marcus King Band’s first recorded project since 2018, King leads with this loose, road-worn Southern rock groove that teams him with Jamey Johnson and Kaitlin Butts. The song is a tribute to musical nomads who chase the impulses of a song around the globe. Each artist brings their own distinct sound to the verses, between King’s soulful grit, Butts’ smoky twang and Johnson’s powerful vocal growl — but when their voices merge, it evokes a freewheeling, jam-band feel that dares fans not to sing along.
Ashby Frank, “Everybody’s Got Their Nine Pound Hammer”
North Carolina native Frank, who last year won the IBMA Awards’ accolade for instrumental recording of the year and is known for his virtuosity as both an in-demand collaborator and solo artist, issues his latest song, a reminder of grace when pain and struggles are universal. “You ain’t no stranger to trouble/ Everybody’s got their share,” he relays over a breakneck banjo and whirring fiddle. Frank leads on vocals and razor-sharp mandolin, joined by Tim Stafford and Kelsey Crews on harmonies, Seth Taylor on guitar, Travis Anderson on upright bass, Jim VanCleve on fiddle and Matt Menefee on banjo.
2 Lane Summer, “One More Minute”
The latest from duo 2 Lane Summer’s Joe Hanson and Chris Ray finds them singing about pining over a long-lost love, but unselfishly hoping the ex-lover is happy in their current circumstances. Polished pop melodies and tidy guitarwork accent the duo’s signature tightly woven harmonies. Taken together, it makes for a breezy summer anthem. Clint and Bob Moffatt (of The Moffatts) wrote the song with Atlanta writer Reed Waddle.
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BeBe Winans and CeCe Winans are set to host the 40th Stellar Gospel Music Awards, which will be held on Saturday (Aug. 16) at Schermerhorn Symphony Center in Nashville. CeCe is also one of the top nominees at this year’s show. She has eight nominations, which puts her just behind Pastor Mike Jr. and Jason Nelson, who each received nine nods.
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The legendary sibling duo are trailblazers in gospel and inspirational music, known for their seamless blend of contemporary gospel, R&B and soul. Hailing from the iconic Winans family, BeBe and CeCe rose to national prominence in the 1980s with their groundbreaking self-titled debut album.
BeBe and Cece cracked the Billboard Hot 100 in 1992 with a remake of The Staple Singers’ 1972 classic “I’ll Take You There” that featured Mavis Staples, lead singer of the original hit. They reached No. 12 on the all-genre Billboard 200 in 2009 with Still.
BeBe and CeCe Winans have won three Grammy Awards, nine Dove Awards, two NAACP Image awards, two Soul Train Music Awards and numerous Stellar Awards. Their Grammy wins are for Different Lifestyles, which was voted best contemporary soul gospel album in 1992; Still, which was voted best contemporary R&B gospel album in 2011; and the track “Grace,” which won best gospel performance in 2011.
Taking the stage for the 40th ceremony thus far are Adia, Donnie McClurkin, Dottie Peoples, Jekalyn Carr, Jason Nelson, Lisa Page Brooks, MAJOR., Melvin Crispell III, Pastor Mike Jr., Pastor Mike Todd & Transformation Worship, Tasha Cobbs Leonard, Tasha Page-Lockhart, Tramaine Hawkins and William Murphy.
The 40th Stellar Gospel Music Awards show is executive produced by Don Jackson with Jennifer J. Jackson serving as producer and executive in charge of production; Michael A. Johnson as producer and director, Erin Johnson as talent producer, and Daniel Moore as music director. Tickets are available now by visiting the Stellar Awards website.
“We’re setting the tone for a night that celebrates 40 years of celebrating the greatest in gospel music,” said Jennifer Jackson, president of Central City Productions.
Additionally, the STELLAR PLUS experience returns with two days of immersive industry and fan-focused events from Thursday, Aug. 14, through Friday, Aug. 15, ahead of the 40th Stellar Gospel Music Awards. Dorinda Clark-Cole and Vincent Bohanan will host the Stellar Nominee Pre-Show Dinner and Awards at the National Museum of African American Music in Nashville on Friday, Aug. 15. This exclusive, invitation-only event is open to all 2025 Stellar Award nominees.
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Forty years ago, at the Live Aid festival in Philadelphia on July 13, 1985, it took Bob Dylan just a few moments to set in motion the music industry’s longest-running concert for a cause — Willie Nelson’s Farm Aid.
Dylan took the stage at JFK Stadium late in the day, just past 10:30 p.m., accompanied by Ronnie Wood and Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones, each with acoustic guitars. (They were preceded by Mick Jagger and Tina Turner’s incendiary duet.)
Opening with two seldom-performed songs from 1964, “Ballad of Hollis Brown” and “When The Ship Comes In,” Dylan then said, in an off-the-cuff manner:
“I hope that some of the money that’s raised for the people in Africa, maybe they can just take a little bit of it — maybe one or two million, maybe — and use it, say, to pay the mortgages on some of the farms that the farmers here owe to the banks.”
“The question hit me like a ton of bricks,” Nelson recalled to his biographer David Ritz in Billboard in 2015. The musician was on the road that day, watching Live Aid on his tour-bus TV.
“Farming was my first job,” he told Billboard. “I picked cotton. I pulled corn. I knew firsthand what it meant to farm. I knew damn well how tough it was. My farm roots are deep-seated in the soil of my personal story.”
So are the roots of Nelson’s philanthropy. In his small hometown of Abbott, Texas, where he attended the United Methodist Church, “we had a collection box, and even though we were struggling financially, I knew there were folks with far greater struggles. As part of a loving community, I was taught the moral responsibility of helping those in need.”
Like Dylan, at that time, Nelson also had been following the news of the family farming crisis that was devastating the heartland of the United States. Prices paid for crops had plummeted. Banks were foreclosing on farms, throwing families off land they had worked, often, for generations. Small towns, dependent on spending by local farmers, were reeling.
David Senter, a fourth-generation farmer and co-founder of the American Agriculture Movement, recalled that time for “Against the Grain,” the Farm Aid podcast.
“The farm crisis was a terrible, expanding tragedy for rural America,” said Senter. “We lost 50 percent of the total family farmers during the crisis. Three-hundred-and-sixty-five farmers a day were going out of business during ’85. We brought a couple of thousand farmers to Washington in March of ’85 and we had a rally on the steps of the Jefferson [Memorial]. We had 365 white crosses [bearing the names of farmers] who had committed suicide or been foreclosed on. And we drove them on the Mall and made a graveyard in front of U.S.D.A.,” the headquarters of the United States Department of Agriculture.
In 1985, Nelson’s booking agent was Tony Conway of Buddy Lee Attractions. For a history of Farm Aid published for the organization’s 20th anniversary, Lee recalled that, in August of that year, Nelson was playing the Illinois State Fair in Springfield, Ill., when the singer said: “I want to do a concert for the American farmers. I want to see if we can do it here in Illinois, just someplace where we can get a stadium.”
“Willie asked me, ‘Do you think you can get a hold of the governor?,’” he recalled. “I made a few calls and got a call back saying [then] Governor Jim Thompson was on his way to the bus.”
Nelson told his idea to Thompson, Lee said, and the governor made a call to secure availability of the football stadium at the University of Illinois in Champaign, Ill., for the one day open in Nelson’s packed autumn touring schedule — Sept. 22, 1985.
Nelson recruited Neil Young and John Mellencamp, who later became the first fellow members of the Farm Aid board. (The board expanded in 2001 to include Dave Matthews and again in 2021 to include Margo Price — who had grown up on a farm which her family lost in 1986, during the crisis which led to the creation of Farm Aid.)
Farm Aid: A Concert for America was put together with the unthinkably short lead time of six weeks. It raised more than $7 million for the nation’s family farmers and featured performers including Billy Joel, Bonnie Raitt, B.B. King, Loretta Lynn, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty — and Bob Dylan.
A front-page story in Billboard, under the bylines of Paul Grein and Kip Kirby, reported that the Jam Productions of Chicago, which help mount Farm Aid, used the same 60-foot diameter, circular, two-stage set that had been used at JFK Stadium for Live Aid.
The Billboard story reported that Nelson wrote the first check on the Farm Aid account to the National Council of Churches in the amount of $100,000 for food pantries to help feed farm families in seven states: Iowa, Minnesota, Wyoming, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Ohio and Kansas. “In addition,” Billboard reported, “Nelson notes that the toll-free 1-800-FARMAID phone lines will remain in operation for one year.”
Forty years later, Farm Aid carries on. The organization has raised more than $80 million to support programs that help family farmers thrive. It has earned a four-star rating from Charity Navigator, the widely known assessment organization for philanthropies.
Nelson, Young, Mellencamp, Matthew and Price will headline this year’s anniversary concert on Sept. 20 at Huntington Bank Stadium in Minneapolis, on a bill with Billy Strings, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, Trampled by Turtles, Waxahatchee, Eric Burton of Black Pumas, Jesse Welles and Madeline Edwards.
Transcending the crisis which sparked its creation, Farm Aid’s mission today is “to build a vibrant, family farm-centered system of agriculture in America,” the organization states on its website. “We’re best known for our annual music, food and farm festival, but the truth is we work each and every day, year-round to build a system of agriculture that values family farmers, good food, soil and water, and strong communities.”
And Dylan, who has been sharing headlining status with Nelson on this summer’s Outlaw Music Festival Tour, made a surprise return to the Farm Aid stage in 2023 at the Ruoff Music Center in Noblesville, Indiana.
Joined by members of The Heartbreakers — whom he first performed with at Farm Aid in 1985 — Dylan walked onstage without any introduction, and played a short-but-intense set of “Maggie’s Farm,” “Positively 4th Street” and “Ballad of a Thin Man” against the stark backdrop of a silhouetted windmill.
His connection to Nelson, to Farm Aid and the cause he first highlighted at Live Aid 40 years ago remains unbroken.
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Beyoncé, Ariana Grande, Selena Gomez and more music stars could become 2025 Primetime Emmy nominees. And you can find out if they make it or not at the very same moment they do – on Tuesday (July 15) at 11:30 a.m. ET/8:30 a.m. PT, when the Television Academy unveils the nominations for the 77th annual Primetime Emmy Awards.
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To watch the nominations livestream, head to this page on the Television Academy site or watch the livestream on YouTube.
What We Do in the Shadows star Harvey Guillén and Running Point star Brenda Song will reveal the nominees alongside TV Academy chair Cris Abrego in a ceremony at the academy’s Wolf Theater in Los Angeles. (The ceremony is held at a much more civilized hour than the Oscar nominations reveal is each year. To watch that, West Coasters have to get up at 5:30 a.m. PT.)
Beyoncé could be well-represented in the nominations. Her Netflix special Beyoncé Bowl has a good chance of being nominated for outstanding variety special (live), where it could face the 2025 Grammy Awards – where Queen Bey finally won her first award for album of the year.
Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, who were nominated for Oscars earlier this year for their performances in Wicked, could be competing against each other for outstanding guest actress in a comedy series. Erivo is eligible with Poker Face; Grande with Saturday Night Live.
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Selena Gomez is likely to be nominated for outstanding comedy series for the fourth year in a row as an executive producer of Only Murders in the Building. She could also be nominated for outstanding lead actress in a comedy series for the second year in a row.
Many other programs featuring top music stars have a shot at nominations in various categories. An Evening With Elton John and Brandi Carlile could be nominated for outstanding variety special (pre-recorded). Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band (Hulu) could be nominated for outstanding documentary special.
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The 2025 Primetime Emmy Awards are set to air on Sept. 14 at 8 p.m./5 p.m. PT on CBS and stream live and on demand on Paramount+. Comedian Nate Bargatze is set to host the show, which will be held at the Peacock Theater in downtown Los Angeles. Bargatze has yet to be nominated for a Primetime Emmy, but he was nominated for a Grammy in 2022 for best comedy album for The Greatest Average American.
The September ceremony will be produced by Jesse Collins Entertainment (Jesse Collins, Dionne Harmon, and Jeannae Rouzan-Clay) for the third consecutive year.
https://i0.wp.com/neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/station.nez_png.png?fit=943%2C511&ssl=1511943Yvetohttps://neztelinc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nez_png.pngYveto2025-07-14 14:11:292025-07-14 14:11:29How to Watch the 2025 Emmy Nominations Announcement Live
