Steve Cropper, an internationally renowned, Grammy-winning guitarist and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee who played with luminaries such as Otis Redding, B.B. King, Booker T. & the MG’s and the Blues Brothers, died Dec. 3 in Nashville. He was 84 years old.
Mr. Cropper’s death was announced on his social media accounts in a statement that called him “a beloved musician, songwriter, and producer.” The cause of death was not disclosed.
In the earliest days of his decades-long career, Mr. Cropper played guitar as a founding member of the Memphis band the Mar-Keys, which had a national hit with “Last Night” in 1961. He formed the band with his childhood friend, Donald “Duck” Dunn, who became a well-known bassist. The two continued to collaborate for years afterward, notably with the famed Booker T. & the MG’s — a groundbreaking, racially integrated R&B/soul studio band formed by Mr. Cropper in 1962.
Mr. Cropper performed on many enduring hits, including with Otis Redding on “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay,” which the two co-wrote, and with Sam & Dave on “Soul Man.”
He also played on two albums with the Blues Brothers and co-wrote hits such as “In the Midnight Hour” with Wilson Pickett, “Knock on Wood” with Eddie Floyd, and “Green Onions” as part of Booker T. & the MG’s.
Stephen Lee Cropper was born on a farm near Dora, Mo., on Oct. 21, 1941. He recalled falling in love with music after his family moved to Memphis when he was 9 years old and he started hearing Black gospel songs on local radio stations.
“I really enjoyed that music. I don’t know what it was. At such a young age, it impressed me,” he recalled in a 1984 interview. “The Black spiritual music … it gave me a whole different attitude about music.”
At aboutage 14, he decided he wanted to play guitar and scraped together $20 to order one from a catalog by setting pins at a bowling alley in Memphis — earning about 10 cents a game. He recalled his shock when he opened the box and found that the instrument had not been strung.
“I went, ‘Wait a minute, isn’t it supposed to be all tuned and all that stuff?’” he said with a laugh. “I really didn’t have a musical background in the family.”
He taught himself how to play, recalling: “I liked the sound of it. I liked the ring of the notes.”
In his acceptance speech when Booker T. & the MG’s was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1992, Mr. Cropper said he was honored to play “with some of the greatest musicians on the planet.”
“It’s been a great career and it’s been a lot of fun,” he said.
Mr. Cropper was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2005. He won two Grammy Awards, in 1968 for “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” with Redding and in 1994 for “Cruisin’” as part of Booker T. & the MG’s. He was nominated for a Grammy nine times.
In 1996, British magazine Mojo ranked him as the second-greatest guitarist of all time, behind only Jimi Hendrix.
“Steve’s influence on American music is immeasurable,” his family said on social media.
“Every note he played, every song he wrote, and every artist he inspired ensures that his spirit and artistry will continue to move people for generations.”
Mr. Cropper is survived by his wife, Angel Cropper, and his four children.
Sabrina Carpenter’s not mincing words when it comes to the Trump administration using one of her songs in a video promoting ICE and the Department of Homeland Security.
On Tuesday, the pop princess condemned the White House for posting a video featuring ICE arresting protesters and undocumented immigrants to one of her songs. The video, which was published on the White House’s X account one day earlier, was captioned “Have you ever tried this one?“ alongside the hearteye emoji and was paired with Carpenter’s track ”Juno.”
It’s a nod to a scene in Carpenter’s just-wrapped “Short n’ Sweet” tour, where she would playfully “arrest” someone in the crowd “for being so hot,” giving them a souvenir pair of fuzzy pink cuffs before performing “Juno.”
Carpenter, a Bucks County native, replied to the post, “this video is evil and disgusting. Do not ever involve me or my music to benefit your inhumane agenda.” Her response has been viewed more than 2 million times.
this video is evil and disgusting. Do not ever involve me or my music to benefit your inhumane agenda.
It’s the latest in a series of similar incidents, where artists ranging from Beyoncé to the Rolling Stones have objected to the White House using their music in videos promoting the Trump administration’s agenda without their consent.
Last month, Olivia Rodrigo had a similar exchange in the comments of a White House Instagram video demanding that undocumented immigrants self-deport over the singer’s track “All-American Bitch.” Rodrigo, who is Filipino American, commented at the time, “Don’t ever use my songs to promote your racist, hateful propaganda.”
The White House also used a song by Carpenter’s friend and musical collaborator, Berks County’s Taylor Swift, last month. Fans of Swift’s called out the use of “The Fate of Ophelia” in a video celebrating President Donald Trump, despite the president’s repeated slights toward the pop star. Swift herself did not comment on the video, but she has previously criticized Trump for posting AI photos of her on his social platforms.
Carpenter, 26, worked with HeadCount on her “Short n’ Sweet” tour, registering 35,814 voters — more than any other artist the nonpartisan voter registration group worked with in 2024. She’s been vocal about her support for LGBTQ+ rights and has publicly donated to the National Immigration Law Center.
When Trump won last year, she took a moment during her concert to say “I’m sorry about our country and to the women here, I love you so, so, so much.”
“Here’s a Short n’ Sweet message for Sabrina Carpenter: We won’t apologize for deporting dangerous criminal illegal murderers, rapists and pedophiles from our country,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson told the New York Times. “Anyone who would defend these sick monsters must be stupid, or is it slow?”
It’s OK if you don’t want to admit how many times you listened to “Golden” from KPop Demon Hunters — Spotify will tell us, anyway.
Spotify Wrapped — the music platform’s annual, aesthetically pleasing deep dive into users’ listening habits — is back again with the feature dropping Wednesday morning.
The 11-year-old feature is both beloved and feared by users for its unflinchingly honest view into users’ favorite music over the last year-ish. So much so, last year, U.S. Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey admitted that he manipulated his Wrapped results to be Bruce Springsteen-forward.
Features include users’ most-listened-to songs, artists, and albums, as well as the duration of time spent listening to music. There are also some bragging rights involved — in the past, users within an artist’s top 1% of listeners could access a special video message and sometimes purchase exclusive merch.
Across social media, users share parodies of their Spotify summary, saying things like “You spent 25,684 minutes this year complaining about Nick Sirianni.” Know Your Meme says the meme format dates back to about 2017.
Wrapped is considered one of Spotify’s signature calling cards and a major driver for user engagement and customer retention. This year, it dropped at the same time some users are boycotting Spotify entirely citing ads heard on the platform and its CEO’s investments.
Here’s more on that and Wrapped 2025:
When did Spotify Wrapped results drop?
Spotify Wrapped was released on Wednesday morning.
Historically, the feature usually drops the week after Thanksgiving, around the first week of December.
How do I see and share my Spotify Wrapped results?
Once Spotify Wrapped is live, here’s how you can see your results. Use the service’s mobile or web browser versions. It is not available on the desktop app.
Here are the steps:
Open Spotify on your phone. A prompt to see your 2025 Wrapped should be visible from the homepage of the app. If it isn’t, or you’re using a web browser, visit www.spotify.com/us/wrapped.
Find the “Wrapped” section in the top navigation bar, a featured playlist, or by typing “Wrapped” in Spotify’s search bar.
This year’s Wrapped results include a “report” and assign listeners to a club based on their listening habits, like the Serotonin Club or the Grit Club. It also has a visual component that shows artists racing for the top of your streams month by month. With bold black and white designs and colorful fonts, it walks you through your listening journey, featuring your total minutes spent listening to music, top songs, artists, genres, and podcasts. One new feature includes users’ “listening age” based on how trendy their picks are among generations.
Each slide of the Wrapped Story has a “share” button at the bottom. Click that button to save each individual slide to your camera roll or post on social media. At the end of your Wrapped Story, there will be a second opportunity to save your Top Artists summary.
What’s the time frame for Spotify Wrapped data?
It’s fuzzy. While Spotify spokespeople previously said data was analyzed between January and October, the streaming platform said in 2023 that Wrapped was still counting past Halloween.
The announcement sparked light controversy among audiophiles — the last week of October was once treated like the ultimate good-music-curating season to ensure impressive results.
Spotify users would also treat November and December like open season, free to blast holiday music on repeat without fear of it reflecting on their “cultural report card.”
But with an indefinite cutoff date, users remain left in the dark when it comes to how their listening habits will be reflected when Wrapped drops. Last year, the company again promised that data collection would happen past Halloween, but hasn’t disclosed a firm deadline.
We don’t know exactly when listening data stopped being collected this year. But we can guess it was sometime in mid- to late November.
Can I modify my results? What does ‘excluding from my taste profile’ really mean?
Where’s the fun in that?
There’s no way to modify your Wrapped results (unless you’re the aforementioned U.S. rep and opt to photoshop them). You get what you get, guilty pleasure songs and all — unless you plan ahead.
Spotify has a feature you can opt out of, including some elements from your listening data.
While using Spotify, users can click the ellipses next to a playlist and select “exclude from your taste profile.” For example, you can exclude your nightly “10 hours of ocean waves” playlist or your kid’s Disney playlist to keep those tracks from influencing your weekly Discover playlists and annual Wrapped data, Spotify says.
The caveat here is this only works for playlists, not individual songs, artists, or albums. A loophole could be curating a playlist of every sleep song, white noise track, guilty pleasure bop, or kids’ music that isn’t yours and excluding that entire playlist from your taste profile. But you’d have to do this ahead of time.
You can’t make edits to your Wrapped results after the fact.
What can I do with my Spotify Wrapped data?
You can post it on social media to brag about your incredible taste, obviously.
Beyond that, there are several third-party sites you can link your Spotify account to that will analyze your Wrapped data and roast you even more.
How Bad is Your Spotify is an AI bot that will judge your music taste. And be warned, it’s kind of harsh. Some results include: “Your spotify was tay-tay-fangirl-cling-clang-pots-and-pans-music-ponytail-pop bad,” “Your spotify was bon-iver’s-impact-escape-room cabincore bad,” and “Your spotify was folklore-evermore-dumbledore-witch-pop-escape-room-has-a-1975-lyric-tattoo bad.” You get the idea.
Receiptify reports your top songs in the form of a shareable shopping receipt graphic, while Instafest conceptualizes a music festival lineup based on your top artists.
What’s up with the Spotify boycott?
In recent months, Spotify’s received backlash over reports that its CEO, Daniel Ek, invested $693.6 million in the European defense technology start-up Helsing. The tech has been criticized for its role in driving the military-industrial complex and ethical concerns over surveillance technology.
Around the same time, reports came out that Spotify — and other streaming services — were running ICE recruitment ads. A spokesperson for the company said the ads were part of a wider ad campaign by the U.S. government running across multiple platforms.
Rolling Stone reported that the Spotify users hearing the ads were using the streaming platform’s free ad-supported tier and that other streaming platforms running the same ad campaign included Amazon Music, Hulu, Max, YouTube, and Pandora as early as April. Apple Music did not run the ads, but it’s a paid-only service with no free ad-supported tier.
Is there a version of Spotify Wrapped for Apple or Amazon Music?
Yes and no. For the first time last year, Amazon Music launched 2024 Delivered, its clapback to the Spotify Wrapped experience. The feature gives a graphic breakdown of users’ listening habits. Amazon Music users can access it by opening the Amazon Music app and tapping a banner that says “2025 Delivered” in their Library.
Apple Music has a feature called Replay, which is available all year and allows users to see a detailed view of their listening habits. Similar to Wrapped, Replay has a “year-end experience.” The Replay year-end experience debuted in 2023. Critics said at the time that Apple’s version lacked in the shareable experiences and themes that Spotify does so well.
YouTube Music also offers a “year in review” recap with breakdowns of users’ top songs, albums, artists, and total listening time over the year.
But none of them feel quite like Wrapped, which is praised for its extra pizazz.
Sixty-two years ago, Allan Sherman was all the rage.
Sherman, the singer and comedian who specialized in wry song parodies rife with references to Jewish culture, released three albums that all topped the Billboard charts in 1963.
The popularity of “Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh (A Letter from Camp),” a song about a spoiled child writing home from summer camp, set to music from Amilcare Ponchielli’s opera La Gioconda, made his My Son, the Nut the fastest-selling album ever up to that point in time.
And judging from the lineup that will perform at “Glory, Glory Allan Sherman: A Celebrity Music and Comedy Salute,” the tribute concert being staged at the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History on Thursday, affection for Sherman, who died in 1973 at age 48, remains strong with musicians across a wide range of genres.
The A-list lineup includes performance artist Laurie Anderson, centenarian Sun Ra Arkestra leader and free jazz sax player Marshall Allen, NRBQ pianist Terry Adams, English songwriter and novelist (and Philly resident) Wesley Stace, Dead Milkmen vocalist Rodney Anonymous, Hooters singer-guitarist Eric Bazilian, and Low Cut Connie bandleader Adam Weiner.
Bringing these eclectic talents together in tribute to the musical humorist who’s been called “Weird Al Yankovic’s Founding ‘Faddah’” is Bucks County native Jonathan Stein, who coproduced the show with his partner Jess Gonchor.
A handful of VIP-level tickets remain for the otherwise sold-out 8 p.m. “Glory, Glory.” By popular demand, a 3 p.m. dress rehearsal show has been added, for which tickets are available.
For over a decade, Stein has been working on an in-and-out-of-development project aiming to bringing a biopic of the pudgy, unlikely pop star who chronicled Jewish life in songs like “Sarah Jackman“ (set to the tune of “Frere Jacques”) and “Harvey and Sheila” (based on “Hava Nagila”).
Sun Ra Arkestra leader Marshall Allen performs at World Cafe Live in Philadelphia on Wednesday, April 9, 2025. He’ll be among the performers at “Glory, Glory Allan Sherman: A Celebrity Music and Comedy Salute,” the tribute concert being staged at the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History on Thursday.
Stein is also a fan of Hal Willner, the Philadelphia-born producer who specialized in bringing musicians of diverse backgrounds together to sing sea chanteys, or honor William S. Burroughs, or recast music from Walt Disney films.
The poster for “Glory, Glory” announces the concert is presented “in conjunction with the spirit of Hal Willner,” who died in the spring of 2020 in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. The eight-piece house band at the show will be led by pianist and bandleader Steve Weisberg, a longtime Willner associate.
Willner, the longtime Saturday Night Live sketch music coordinator, was the son of a Polish Holocaust survivor who co-owned Hymie’s Deli in Merion Station. In 2014, Willner put on a Sherman tribute in New York that featured many “Glory, Glory” guests, plus luminaries like the composer Philip Glass.
Philadelphia-born record producer Hal Willner, who died in 2020. He is the inspiration behind “Glory, Glory Allan Sherman: A Celebrity Music and Comedy Salute,” the tribute concert being staged at the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History on Thursday. The photo was taken by Willner’s late friend Lou Reed.
The diversity of the “Glory, Glory” bill reflects Willner’s try-anything aesthetic. It includes Robert Smigel, the comic behind Triumph the Insult Comic Dog; actress Chloe Webb, who played Sid Vicious’ Philadelphia-born girlfriend Nancy Spungen in Sid & Nancy; and “banshee mandolin” player John Kruth.
“Hal had this Rolodex, and people just wanted to do his shows,” says Stein. “When we started talking about doing this, and Hal’s name was invoked, people started coming on board left and right, because they know what kind of show it’s going to be, and they want to be a part of it.”
When Dan Samuels, the Weitzman’s director of public programs, first got Stein’s pitch to bring the Sherman show to the museum he thought, “This is crazy!” but in the best possible way, he says, while on a Zoom call with Stein this week.
Generations of fans “came up on Allan Sherman, or their parents had the records in the house, or their grandparents had the records in the house, or maybe because they just know [”Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh”],” says Samuels, who also grew up in Bucks County. “They’re going to be surprised when they realize the version of the songs are not going to sound like they did on the records. They might be really surprised when they hear Marshall Allen.”
Philadelphia singer and novelist Wesley Stace is among the performers at “Glory, Glory Allan Sherman: A Celebrity Music and Comedy Salute,” the tribute to the late song parodist and comedian Allan Sherman at the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History.
Stace counted himself in, and connected Stein with the Hooters’ Bazilian and Low Cut Connie’s Weiner. “They both e-mailed me back and said: ‘I’m in,’” Stein says. “And those three right there are the beginnings of a great hometown show.”
Almost all of the artists on Stein’s wish list came back with a yes, including pianist Adams, who worked with Willner on many projects, and Anderson, who also teamed with Willner and is the widow of Willner’s close friend Lou Reed.
Just this week, however, he did get “a very kind rejection letter from the Phillie Phanatic. He expressed his regrets and “apologized that he’s already booked,” Stein says.
Another Philly icon that Stein did get is the Dead Milkmen’s Anonymous. He’ll sing a song called “I’m a Punk.”
“Allan voiced The Cat in the Hat for CBS in 1971,” Stein says. “It’s just a really clever, pre-punk punk song, with the guy declaring that he’s just a punk,” which rhymes with “a crutunkulous shnunk!”
“When I asked him,” Stein says, “he said ‘Oh my God, I’m so honored to do it. My Mom and I would sing Allan Sherman songs together all the time.”
The poster for Glory, Glory Allan Sherman: A Celebrity Music and Comedy Salute, is being staged at the Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History on Thursday,
Stace’s history with Sherman goes back to his mid-‘70s schoolboy days in England. At a friend’s house, a pile of Velvet Underground, David Bowie, T-Rex and Roxy Music records gave him “my first proper education in music,” he says. And there was also one Allan Sherman album, My Son, the Celebrity, the second hit LP from 1963.
“That’s the one with the liner notes that says ‘the family are croquet players, with mallets toward none,’” says Stace, with a laugh. “I know that album inside out.”
At the Sherman tribute, Stace will perform “Won’t You Please Come Home, Disraeli” sung in the character of Queen Victoria to the tune of “Won’t You Come Home, Bill Bailey,” and “Me,” in which Sherman described his physique as “a carcass” dressed in “the best from Neiman Marcus.”
“They’re both very funny songs,” Stace says. “I hope to do them justice.”
“Glory, Glory Allan Sherman: A Celebrity Music and Comedy Salute,” Dec. 4, 8 p.m., Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History, 101 South Independence Mall East. There is also a 3 p.m. dress rehearsal. theweitzman.org
The holiday concert season in Philly is in full swing, with touring acts and local musicians capping off the year with plenty fa la la la la from now until Christmas Day.
This list of recommended shows includes pop, rock, R&B, country, hip-hop, EDM, gospel, and jazz, all in the end-of-the-year business of spreading musical holiday cheer.
Jane Lynch
Dec. 2, Keswick Theatre
Glee and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel actor and comedian Jane Lynch put out an album called A Swingin’ Little Christmas in 2016, and she tours regularly in the holiday season. She sings along with The Office’s Kate Flannery and Glee vocal arranger Tim Davis with a 1950s and ‘60s Frank Sinatra-Andy Williams style Christmas repertoire. 8 p.m., keswicktheatre.com.
Aimee Mann and Ted Leo’s Christmas Show comes to City Winey Philadelphia on Dec. 3.
The Aimee Mann & Ted Leo Christmas Show
Dec. 3, City Winery
This offbeat music and comedy holiday duo teams up top shelf songwriter Mann, who released the excellent melancholy holiday album, One More Drifter in the Snow in 2006, and punk rock veteran Leo. They have a history of performing and recording together as the Both, and will be joined by Philly-born comic Paul F. Tompkins and utterly charming cabaret singer Nellie McKay. 8 p.m., citywinery.com/philadelphia
LeAnn Rimes
Dec. 6, Keswick Theatre
Veteran country singer LeAnn Rimes — who released her first album in 1991, when she was 9 — is on a Greatest Hits Christmas Tour. That means she’ll be singing Christmas songs from her multiple holiday albums, plus her biggest hits. 8 p.m., keswicktheatre.com.
Don McCloskey
Dec. 6, Brooklyn Bowl
Philly songwriter Don McCloskey is known for his 2008 Phillies fight song “Unstoppable,” his association with the It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia crew, and most recent album The Chaos and the Beauty. He and his eight-piece band — including singers Hannah Taylor and Sarah Biemuller — throw their annual “Holiday Office Party” in Fishtown. 8 p.m., BrooklyBowl.com/philadelphia
Work Drugs
Dec. 6, Double Nickel Brewing Company
Work Drugs, the smooth, soft rockers who self-identify as “Philadelphia’s premier bat mitzvah and quinceañera party band,” is throwing its 14th annual Holiday Spectacle, and has just released a cover of Alexander O’Neal’s ”Our First Christmas.” They’ll be joined by opener Nero Catalano for a free show at Double Nickel Brewing Company in Pennsauken. 8 p.m., dnbcbeer.com
V. Shayne Frederick performing at the University of the Arts in 2022. The jazzman will sing at South Jazz Kitchen on Dec. 6 and 7.
V. Shayne Frederick
Dec. 6, 7. South Jazz Kitchen
In 2022, Philly jazz vocalist V. Shayne Frederick released The King Suite, an album of songs associated with Nat “King” Cole filtered through the African musical diaspora. Cole sang the definitive version of Mel Torme’s classic “The Christmas Song,” so expect Frederick to have his way with it when he plays two “A Very V. Shayne Frederick Holiday” shows each night on Dec. 6 and 7. Times vary, SouthJazz Kitchen.com
Various artists at Chris’ Jazz Cafe
Starting Dec. 6 and through December
The Center City club will deck the halls all December long.
On Dec. 6, the Tim Brey Trio celebrate the 10th anniversary of the pianist’s holiday release Unwrap. Dec. 9, 16, and 23 are Holiday Soul nights with trumpeter Josh Lawrence & Friends. On Dec. 17, it’s the Peter Frank Orchestra’s Holiday Show. Dec. 18, the Laura Orzehoski Quartet plays Vince Guaraldi Christmas Classics.
The next night, it’s the Benny Benack Quintet Holiday Show featuring Michael “Sonny Step” Stephenson. The Anais Reno Quintet’s “White Christmas” Holiday show is Dec. 20, and Bruce Klauber Swings the Sinatra Christmas Songbook on Dec. 24. Times vary, ChrisJazzCafe.com.
Bela Fleck & the Flecktones bring their Jingle All the Way tour to the Miller Theater on Dec. 12.
Bela Fleck & the Flecktones
Dec. 12, Miller Theater
Virtuoso banjoist Bela Fleck and bandmates Howard Levy, Roy “Future Man” Wooten, and Victor Wooten recorded the reimagined holiday songs album Jingle All the Way in 2008. They’ve reunited for this tour, which will draw from their nonseasonal catalog as well. The quartet will be joined by both saxophonist Jeff Coffin and Tuvan throat singing ensemble Alash, so expect Christmas music unlike any you’ve heard before. 8 p.m., EnsembleArtsPhilly.org.
Santa Rave
Dec. 12, Brooklyn Bowl
Have yourself a very EDM Xmas at this Fishtown dance party, which promises holiday hits, “2000s and 2010s” remixes and dubstep, techno and dance grooves, courtesy of DJ Pad Chennington. 8 p.m., broooklynbowl.com/philadelphia
Laufey performs during the Newport Jazz Festival in 2024. She will sing at the Jingle Ball at Xfinity Mobile Arena on Dec. 15.
Jingle Ball
Dec. 15, Xfinity Mobile Arena
This annual holiday season pop star cavalcade is presented by radio station WIOQ (102.1-FM), better known as Q102. This year, it includes pop-rock sibling band AJR, Icelandic jazz singer Laufey, YouTuber turned “Ordinary” international hitmaker Alex Warren, and Texas country rapper BigXthaPlug, among others. 7:30 p.m., XfinityMobileArena.com
Ben Folds
Dec. 16-18, City Winery
In 2024, piano man Ben Folds released his first Christmas album, Sleigher, mixing chestnuts with new songs, including the gem “Christmas Time Rhyme.” His solo tour will being him to Philly for three Tis The Season shows this month. 7:30 p.m., citywinery.com/philadelphia.
Darlene Love
Dec. 17, Keswick Theatre
Darlene Love was dubbed “the Christmas Queen” long before Mariah Carey had any claim to the throne. She sang three songs on Phil Spector’s classic 1963 A Christmas Gift For You, including the unstoppable “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home),” which she performed annually for 28 years on David Letterman’s late night TV show before moving to The View on 2015. She brings her Love For the Holidays tour to Glenside this year. 8 p.m., keswicktheatre.com
CeCe Winans performing in 2019. Her Christmas with CeCe Wians comes to the Met Philly on Dec. 18.
CeCe Winans
Dec. 18, the Met
Beyoncé, Alison Krauss, and Aretha Franklin are the only women with more Grammys than CeCe Winans, who’s tied with Alicia Keys with 17. The daughter of Detroit’s first family of gospel released her second Christmas album, Joyful Joyful in 2024, and the powerhouse vocalist is headed to North Broad Street on her “Christmas with CeCe Winans” tour, accompanied by sisters Angie and Debbie Winans. 8 p.m., themetphilly.com
The Tisburys will be joined by Stella Ruze and Nervous Nikki & the Chill Pills on Dec. 20 at the Sellersville Theater in Bucks County. Left to right: Dan Nazario, Ben Cardine, Tyler Asay, John Domenico, Jason McGovern.
The Tisburys
Dec. 20, Sellersville Theater
Indie rock quintet the Tisburys, whose 2025 album A Still Life Revisited is one of the standout Philly releases of the year, will be playing holiday songs atop a ‘Tis the Season triple bill. The band will be joined by Stella Ruze and Nervous Nikki & the Chill Pills. 8 p.m., st94.com.
The Klezmatics
Dec. 23, City Winery
The musically adventurous klezmer band, the Klezmatics, has won a Grammy for a Woody Guthrie tribute album and has recorded with violinist Itzhak Perlman. Known for lyrics that comment on world affairs, the band’s Happy Joyous Hanukkah Tour — “a celebration of light in dark times” — arrives one day after the holiday ends. 7:30 p.m., citywinery.com/philadelphia.
Mars Co-Op, the Philadelphia rapper known for the standout verse he contributed to The Roots’ song “Clones” from 1996, has died.
His death last week was confirmed on Sunday by Dice Raw, the Philly rapper who is a long-standing member of the extended Roots family, and was first reported on AllHipHop.com.
Mars Co-Op, who was born Phillip Blenman, was raised in the East Logan section of Philadelphia. He brought a toughness and street-wise energy to The Roots’ third album, Illadelph Halflife.
He is featured on the recording for “Clones,” a single from Illadelph in which he trades verses about urban violence with principal Roots rapper Tariq “Black Thought” Trotter and Dice Raw.
“I try to tell ya,” he rapped. “Don’t let these street … fail ya / The way [people] by gettin’ clapped, [will] scare ya!”
The video for “Clones” was shot in Brooklyn’s Greenpoint neighborhood and features a young Trotter and Roots drummer Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson, as well as other band members including the late bassist Leonard “Hub” Hubbard.
“I grew up in the streets. … I ran away from home, got out on the streets, shooting [people], doing all types of [stuff]. Luckily, at some point in my life, I did have a father. The music saved my life,” Mars Co-Op, who also went by Black Caesar, told AllHipHop.com in 2012.
“We brought the streets to The Roots. Early on, they was doing street festivals and stuff, and then me and Malik [B] was doing stuff that our peoples liked. Me and Dice was from Logan, so our style was different. We was that street stuff,” he told the website.
After Illadelph Halflife, Mars and Malik B left The Roots and formed the label Tali Up Boyz Records. Malik B died in July 2020 at age 47.
Patti Smith stood onstage at the Met Philadelphia on Saturday during her 50th anniversary tour for her 1975 album Horses. She recalled her elementary school report cards when she was growing up in Germantown in the 1950s.
“They would always say, ‘Patti Lee shows a lot of potential, but she daydreams too much,’” she said. “‘Will she amount to anything?’”
The revered punk poet and undiminished life force, who will turn 79 on Dec. 30, smiled and looked out at the cheering sold-out crowd, mirroring their affection.
“You are my answer,” she said.
Philadelphia was the final stop on the Horses tour, commemorating the majestic John Cale-produced album with an iconic cover photo by Robert Mapplethorpe that lit the fuse for a punk rock conflagration to come.
Smith came onstage dressed in black jeans and a suit jacket, accompanied by her band, with original 1970s members Lenny Kaye and Jay Dee Daugherty on guitar and drums, joined by her son, Jackson Smith, on guitar, and Tony Shanahan on bass and keyboard.
They started with “Gloria,” Smith’s reworked version of the 1964 Van Morrison-penned Them hit that began, as always, with the still startling declaration, “Jesus died for somebody’s sins, but not mine.” She then went on to take responsibility for her own actions, seeking rock and roll salvation on her own terms.
“My sins, my own,” she sang in a voice that has lowered in register in the last half century but lost none of its power. She often sounded as if she were channeling otherworldly spirits.
“They belong to me,” she sang.
Patti Smith and her band perform “Horses” on its 50th anniversary at the Met Philadelphia on Saturday, Nov. 29, 2025.
The band steadily built to a roar, with Kaye and Shanahan chiming in along with the crowd on chanted vocals.
Track one, side one. “G-L-O-R-I-A!” — catharsis was already achieved.
The eight-song Horses was performed in its entirety, essentially straight through but with a few songs flip-flopped in order. “Free Money,” about dreaming of hitting the lottery and lifting her family up financially, preceded the epic improvised-in-the-studio “Birdland.” For that song, Smith put on glasses to read out the rapid-fire incantatory lyrics from one of her own books, as the song built to a crescendo.
There was little chitchat during Horses itself, save for a dedication of “Elegie” to Jimi Hendrix and a story about hanging out in the 1970s with the late Television guitarist Tom Verlaine at a Manhattan magazine shop called Flying Saucer News. The duo teamed to write “Break It Up,” a song inspired by Smith’s dream of coming upon a marble statue of Jim Morrison, “like Prometheus in chains, with long flowing hair,” lying in a clearing in the woods.
Horses built to a climax with “Land,” complete with its ecstatic “Do the Watusi” romp through Chris Kenner’s “Land of 1000 Dances” and a reprise of “Gloria.” Then, Smith took a break.
While offstage, the band served up a treat: a three-song tribute to Television, the Smith group’s “sister band” with whom it shared a four-nights-a-week residency at CBGB in New York in 1975. Kaye and Shanahan took turns on vocals on “See No Evil,” “Friction,” and “Marquee Moon,” and Kaye and Jackson Smith (who shone throughout the evening) paid aural homage to Verlaine and Richard Lloyd’s guitar interplay.
Patti Smith and her band perform “Horses” on its 50th anniversary at the Met Philadelphia on Saturday, Nov. 29, 2025.
The second half of the two-hour-plus show surveyed Smith’s five-decade post-Horses career, with ‘70s rock radio hits like “Dancing Barefoot” and her Bruce Springsteen co-write “Because the Night.” That was dedicated to her late husband, Fred “Sonic” Smith, and included an exultant, crowd-pleasing declaration that she was back onstage in the city that shaped her “because the night belongs to Philadelphia.”
“Ain’t It Strange” and “Pissing in the River,” two songs from 1976’s Horses follow-up Radio Ethiopia were included, both holding up well in stately versions. The latter included an origin story about Smith walking to school with her sisters and being afraid of high winds blowing them into Wissahickon Creek.
Smith explained that “Peaceable Kingdom” — a song that shares a title with a painting by Quaker artist Edward Hicks at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts — was written “for the Palestinian people” with Shanahan “with great hope” in 2003.
“Now,” she said, “we sing it with great sorrow.”
A slowed, and somber, segment of “People Have the Power,” her populist anthem penned with her late husband, was added onto the end of the prayerlike song.
For an encore, Smith brought out her daughter, Jesse Paris Smith — who will join the singer and author, Jackson Smith, and Shanahan at Marian Anderson Hall on Monday for a “Songs & Stories” performance that kicks off a book tour for her new memoir, Bread of Angels.
Together with Kaye, Smith sang “Ghost Dance,” a song from 1978’s Easter that she said the two wrote “with great respect and love for the Hopi tribe.” She urged that “we need to be diligent” in resisting “our present administration who show no empathy, respect, or love for our Native Americans.”
That was followed by the full-on, rocked-out “People Have the Power,” for which the band was joined by New Jersey guitarist and longtime Smith associate James Mastro.
But before leaping into her testament of faith in democratic ideals that name-checked the Declaration of Independence and Independence Hall, Smith had a few more words for the city where “I discovered art, and battled bullies.”
“I’m just so happy to be in Philadelphia,” she said. “In 1967, I had to leave Philadelphia to look for a job. I got on the Greyhound bus and went to New York City. I was 20 years old and I built a new life, … but it all began with that decision to get on that bus. And I might have left Philadelphia physically, but it’s always been in my heart.”
“People Have the Power” was reliably inspiring, stirring the heart with marching music fit for taking to the streets. But Smith took the extra step of adding a closer that she often covered in her mid-1970s Horses era: the Who’s “My Generation.”
“Hope I die before I get old,” she sang, gleefully echoing Pete Townshend’s 1960s youth culture mantra. But then, she added her own in-song commentary that playfully raised the possibility of future Horses anniversary tours just as thrilling as this one.
“And I am old!” Smith shouted. “And I’m going to get older! I’m going to live to a hundred and two!”
Songs & Stories with Patti Smith: Bread of Angels Book Tour at Marian Anderson Hall, 300 S. Broad St. at 7 p.m. Monday. ensembleartsphilly.org.
Patti Smith has been associated with New York for her entire public life.
In 1971, her first poetry and music performance was at St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery with Lenny Kaye on the guitar. Along with the Ramones, Talking Heads, Television, and Blondie, she was a vital force in the mid-1970s CBGB music scene.
And in 1975, she recorded Horses at Electric Lady Studios. That galvanic debut album made her an instant punk rock and feminist hero. On Saturday, she’ll celebrate its 50th anniversary at the Met Philly, with a band that includes Kaye, drummer Jay Dee Daugherty, bassist Tony Shanahan, and her son Jackson Smith on guitar.
“People think of me as a New Yorker,” Smith said, in an interview with The Inquirer from her home in New York.
“Well, I’ve lived in New York. But I was pretty much formed by the time I got to New York. The places that helped form me were Philadelphia and rural South Jersey.”
At the Met, Smith and her band will perform Horses in its entirety, starting with the take on Van Morrison’s “Gloria” that introduced her as a brash, provocative artist with one of the most memorable opening lines in rock and roll history: “Jesus died for somebody’s sins … but not mine.”
“It’s going to be a special night, because I hardly ever get to play with my son and daughter,” said Smith, who turns 79 on Dec. 30. “So I’m really, really happy about that, bringing my kids to Philadelphia.”
Bread of Angels, unlike her 2010 National Book Award-winning Just Kids, doesn’t zero in on a particular episode in the storied career of the enduring punk icon.
“Bread of Angels: A Memoir” by Patti Smith. MUST CREDIT: Random House
Instead, Bread takes the full measure of her life. It begins in Chicago where she was born before her parents moved back to Philadelphia while she was a toddler, and turns on a late-in-life DNA revelation that shakes up her conception of her own identity.
“I didn’t plan to do this book,“ Smith said. “Truthfully, it came to me in a dream.”
In her dream, she had written a book telling the story of her life in four sections. She wore a white dress, just as she does on the cover of Bread of Angels, in a 1979 photo taken by Robert Mapplethorpe.
“It was so specific, this dream, that it sort of haunted me. And I felt like it was a sign that perhaps it was a book I should write. …. It took quite a while.”
Bread of Angels is “a love letter to certain places.”
“Philadelphia when I was young,” she said. “I love Philly. And then down in rural South Jersey, and the places in Michigan I lived with my husband.”
Summaries of Smith’s life typically cite that she lived in Germantown before moving first to Pitman and then Deptford Heights in South Jersey, before moving to New York in 1967.
But Smith’s childhood was actually much more peripatetic.
“I think we moved nine times while we were in Philly,” she recalled, including stops in Upper Darby and South Philadelphia.
“My mother had three of us in rapid succession,” said Smith. It was after the war, and a lot of the rooming houses we stayed in absolutely didn’t allow infants, so my mother was always hiding the pregnancy or hiding the baby. And then we’d get found out and have to move again.”
Patti Smith at the Venice Film Festival in Venice, Italy in 2024.
Her coming of age Philadelphia stories in the book evoke a happy, lower middle class childhood.
Living in a converted soldier’s barracks in Germantown she calls “the Patch,” she once beat all the boys and girls in a running race, but tripped and landed on a piece of glass, leaving blood rushing down her face. She was treated at Children’s Hospital, and rode a bicycle for the first time the following week.
“I left the perimeter of the Patch, pedaled up toward Wayne Avenue,” she writes. “I was six and half years old with seven stitches, and for that one hour, on that two-wheeler, I was a champion.”
On her seventh birthday, her mother, who then worked at the Strawbridge & Clothier department store at Eighth and Market, took her to Leary’s, the Center City bookshop that closed in 1968.
“Oh my gosh it was a wonderful bookshop,” she said. “On your birthday, you had to show your birth certificate and pay $1, and you could fill your shopping bag.”
Her bag, she said, was filled “with some very good books that I still own.”
A copy each of Pinocchio, The Little Lame Prince, an Uncle Wiggily book.
Patti Smith and her late husband Fred “Sonic” Smith, as pictured in “Bread of Angels,” her new memoir. Smith and her band will play the Met Philly on Nov. 29 on the final date of their tour celebrating the 50th anniversary of her 1975 debut album “Horses.” She will also appear on Dec. 1 at Marian Anderson Hall at the Kimmel Center in a Songs & Stories event on her Bread of Angels book tour.
As a Jersey teenager in the early 1960s, she had a crush on a South Philly boy named Butchy Magic. She once got stung by a hornet outside a dance, she writes in the book, and he looked deep into her eyes and pulled the stinger out from her neck.
“This is what the writer craves,” she writes. “A sudden shaft of brightness containing the vibration of a particular moment … Butchy Magic’s fingers extracting the stinger. The unsullied memory of unpremeditated gestures of kindness. These are the bread of angels.”
As in the book, Philadelphia loomed large over Smith’s childhood, well after the family moved to Gloucester County.
“It was our big city. It was where I discovered rock and roll,” she said.
She discovered art when her father Grant and mother Beverly took her and her younger siblings Linda, Kimberly, and Todd to the Philadelphia Museum of Art (now Philadelphia Art Museum). There, she fell for Pablo Picasso, John Singer Sargent, and Amedeo Modigliani.
“Culturally, it was the city that helped form me,” she said.
“It amazes me that half a century has gone by and people are still greatly interested in the material,” she said. “It’s a culmination of a period in my life.”
In 2012, when Smith and her sister Linda took DNA tests, Smith had already begun writing Bread of Angels. The result of the test was a shock: Grant Smith was not her biological father.
Her birth was actually the result of a relationship between Beverly Smith and a handsome Jewish pilot named Sidney who had returned to Philadelphia from World War II.
Bob Dylan and Patti Smith at the Electric Factory in Philadelphia in 1995.
“It was completely unexpected,” Smith said. “My mother was a great oral storyteller, but none of her stories gave any indication that I was fathered by a different man. … She certainly kept that a secret from everyone.”
Of the emotions Smith felt, one was “some sorrow,” she said. “Because I loved and admired my father. I felt sad because I didn’t have his blood. But I modeled myself after him so much. All of those things remain.”
She stopped work on Bread of Angels for two years.
“I didn’t know how to deal with it. Is this book false? Do I have to rewrite everything? And then I realized I didn’t have to rewrite anything. My father is still my father. But you can also show gratitude to the man who conceived with my mother. Who gave me life. So I figured it out. I have two fathers.”
Her mother, father, and biological father had all died by the time she learned the news of her parentage.
Some of Smith’s self-confidence — evident in the way she spells out “G-L-O-R-I-A!” — “might have come from the biological father I never knew,” she said. “He was a pilot. When he was young, he had this tough job. I’ve met a few people who knew him. They said he was very kind and good-hearted. He loved art, he loved to travel. He had not a conceited, but a self-confident air.
“I’ve always had that, and wondered where it came from,” she said. “I’ve always possessed that kind of self-confidence. I’ve never had trouble going on stage. So I think I have to salute my blood father, right?”
In Bread of Angels, Smith recalls her early life in Philly, and writes: “I did not want to grow up. I wanted to be free to roam, to construct room by room the architecture of my own world.”
Seven decades later, she’s still doing that, as she continues to create and perform for adoring audiences around the world.
“I have stayed in contact with my 10-year-old self, always,” she said. “I still carry around the girl that had her dog, and slept in the forest, and read [her] books, and got in trouble, and didn’t want to grow up.”
Patti Smith and daughter Jesse Paris Smith in Milan, Italy, in 2019.
She turns 80 next year.
“My hair is gray to platinum. I understand my age. I’ve had my children, and have gone through a lot of different things. But I still know where my 10-year-old self is. I still know how to find her.”
Patti Smith and Her Band perform “Horses” on its 50th anniversary at the Met Philly, 858 N. Broad St. at 8 p.m. Saturday, themetphilly.com.
“Patti Smith: Songs & Stories” at Marian Anderson Hall, 300 S. Broad St., at 7 p.m. Monday, ensembleartsphilly.org
There’s more drama happening at the World Cafe Live.
The University City music venue has been racked by labor strife since staff members walked off the job in June to protest what they said were unfair working conditions under the longstanding club’s new leadership under CEO Joseph Callahan.
The concert schedule has grown sparse at both the WCL’s intimate upstairs Lounge and larger downstairs Music Hall.
The one reliable highlight has been the Friday Free at Noon series presented by WXPN-FM (88.5), the University of Pennsylvania radio station that’s also located at 3025 Walnut St. but is an entirely separate business.
Now, you can’t even get a drink at World Cafe Live. At least, not an alcoholic one.
Word of that lapse this week coincided with XPN moving the Free at Noon series — at least temporarily — out of West Philly to the Main Line in Montgomery County.
Reached for comment about the temporary move, WXPN general manager Roger LaMay did not say whether the decision to move the FAN series — which celebrated its 20th anniversary earlier this year — to Ardmore was specifically based on the lapsed liquor license.
Multiple attempts to reach World Cafe Live management for comment on the status of the liquor license and the Free at Noon shows were met with no response.
As of Halloween, the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Broad’s site has listed the entry for Real Entertainment Philadelphia, Inc. as “EXPIRED.”
Union rep Kerrick Edwards shows a support sticker outside the World Cafe Live building on Thursday, July, 2025.
The company’s license still bears the name of Hal Real, who founded WCL in 2004 and later converted it into a nonprofit before stepping down in the spring. He was replaced by Callahan, the Philly native technologist and entrepreneur who was responsible for bringing the Portal to Center City last year.
When he took over from Real in May, Callahan said that the venue had accumulated $6 million in debt and was losing up to $70,000 a month. He told The Inquirer in June he was dedicated to putting the venue on sound financial footing and vowed to utilize virtual reality technology “to bring the world to World Cafe Live, virtually and digitally.”
On Wednesday, a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania LCB confirmed that the license is expired and said “its renewal is pending the receipt of information from the licensee, the licensee does not have operating authority at this time.”
Since the WCL’s license expired, alcohol sales reportedly continued at some shows, such as the Josh Ritter Free at Noon performance in the Music Hall on Nov. 14, according to patrons.
But at Wednesday night’s show in the Lounge with Montclair, N.J., bandleader Lily Vakali and Philly guitarist Mighty Joe Castro, all beer taps were turned off. No booze was served, a World Cafe Live staffer said, adding that the venue expects to have a BYO policy for the next few weeks until the license is renewed.
Joseph Callahan of World Cafe Live at World Cafe Live, 3025 Walnut St., on June 18, 2025.
This weekend, the WCL has a busy schedule. Contemporary Christian singer Terrian was scheduled for Thursday night in the Music Hall, Philly Irish music singer John Byrne Band is set to play in the Lounge on Friday, and salsero Alex Moreno Singer will sing in the Lounge on Saturday.
At a Town Hall meeting in July, then-World Cafe Live president Gar Giles — who has since left the company — publicly recognized Philly unions Unite Here Local 274 and IATSE Local 8 to represent World Cafe Live workers.
Since then, “World Cafe Live has refused to come to the bargaining table,” said Mat Wranovics of Unite Here, which represents food service and front-of-house workers at the venue. “Despite the announcements and promises they’ve made, not one of the workers they’ve fired has been given their job back.”
In September, Callahan stepped aside as CEO and president, though insiders say he remains atop the World Cafe Live board and in charge of the venue. Callahan has been replaced J. Sean Diaz, a Penn grad who is a former DJ as well as a music producer and entertainment lawyer.
“Whatever financial concerns that this place has had, I’m very positive that we are going to connect with all of the resources, all of the partnerships, all of the organizations that we need to be successful,” Diaz told the Daily Pennsylvanian in September. “I’m here to be that agent of change.”
At time of publication, neither Callahan nor Diaz had responded to requests for comment for this story.
Once again, Philadelphia music fans can look forward to a Drugcember to remember.
Next month, Philly rock band The War On Drugs will renew a tradition that has been on hiatus since 2022. It will perform a trio of fundraising shows to benefit the Fund for the School District of Philadelphia, the nonprofit that raises money and coordinates investments into Philadelphia Schools.
The Adam Granduciel-led seven piece band, that won a best rock album Grammy for A Deeper Understanding in 2018, will play three nights at Johnny Brenda’s in Fishtown, from Dec. 18-20.
The 250 capacity club — which the band first played on the venue’s opening weekend in 2006 — is several magnitudes smaller that the amphitheater, arena, and festival stages the Drugs typically plays in venues around the world.
Drugcember to Remember debuted in 2018 and became an annual Philly three-show tradition through 2022, with the exception of the COVID shutdown year of 2020.
But it hadn’t taken place since 2022, and seemed in danger of being gone for good, with Granduciel now living on Los Angeles and bassist and original members Dave Hartley in North Carolina.
Granduciel said in a statement that the return to the treasured tradition is a way to reaffirm its Philadelphia identity.
The flyer for The War on Drugs’ 2025 ‘A Drugcember to Remember’ benefit shows at Johnny Brenda’s on Dec. 18-20.
“This has been a year end highlight for me since we started doing it in 2018,” said the guitarist and songwriter who stepped out as a producer in 2025 on Craig Finn’s Always Been and Sam Fender’s People Watching. “Three rock shows at our old local hangout benefiting the Philadelphia School System. This band wouldn’t exist if not for the vibrant Philadelphia music community that has supported us from the beginning and we are very grateful for it.”
The War On Drugs’ most recent studio album, I Don’t Live Here Anymore, came out in 2021. Last year, they released the in-concert recording Live Drugs Again.
Its most recent Philadelphia performance was in the summer of 2024, sharing a bill with the National at the Mann Center in Fairmount Park. Besides the Drugcember shows, the only two dates on the band’s schedule are at festivals in Spain and Portugal in July 2026.
A Drugcember To Remember will raise funds through ticket sales and also the sale of exclusive items though Philadelphia businesses, including Elixr Coffee, Sacred Vice Brewing, Room Shop, Uncle Ron’s Candles, and Kinetic Skateboarding/Nocturnal Skate Shop.
Ticket for the Johnny Brenda’s shows go on sale at 10 a.m. Friday Nov. 21 at thewarondrugs.net/tour.
