Some of music’s biggest stars will be hitting the stage for a Prince tribute concert that will be pre-recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on Jan. 28, two days after the 62nd annual Grammy Awards. It’ll then air on CBS in April.
The event is called “Let’s Go Crazy: The Grammy Salute to Prince” and some of the performers will include Usher, Alicia Keys, Common, John Legend, H.E.R., Mavis Staples, Earth, Wind & Fire and Coldplay’s Chris Martin.
Sheila E., Prince’s former drummer, will be the musical director for the concert, as will Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, who grew up with the late singer in Minneapolis, Minn.
“I was very honored to be able to do this for so many reasons,” Sheila E. told Rolling Stone about the post-Grammy event. “But to be able to help celebrate the life of a dear friend and be a part of this and be musical director is awesome.”
Similar Grammy tribute concerts have been staged in honor of other musicians, including Stevie Wonder and Aretha Franklin.
Prince died on April 21, 2016 at his Paisley Park home, located in Chanhassen, Minnesota. NBC reports the singer thought he was taking Vicodin but actually ingested a phony painkiller that contained Fentanyl, which caused him to overdose.
Since Prince’s death, there’s been posthumous releases and projects to honor him, like when his estate reissued a remastered version of his classic “1999” album in November of last year.
Plus, Cathy Robinson and Lori Marcuz, who used to design clothes for the Purple One under their company Call & Response, recently released a new line that was inspired by those designs.
But, obviously, a tribute concert is another type of way to honor Prince and comes with its own set of unique challenges, which Grammy producer Ken Ehrlich talked about.
“Sometimes you worry about these things, because when an artist is so iconic, so individualistic and so unique, you get a little bit nervous about having people interpret their work,” he explained.
“But I think, if anything, based on what we’ve done with these past shows, either we’ve gotten a little foolhardy to think that we could do Prince, or we’ve gotten confident that there are artists out there who fit; who will be faithful to what he did and reverent enough not to f–k around with him.”
