![\"WN_5_Herrington_HI-660\"](\"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/WN_5_Herrington_HI-660.jpg\")
<\/h1>\n<\/h1>\nConsider this most varied grouping: Barbra Streisand, Sheryl Crow, Kris Kristofferson, Tony Bennett, Bono, John Mayer, Elvis Costello, Cyndi Lauper, Steven Tyler, Paul Anka, Carlos Santana, Sharon Osbourne, Ozzy Osbourne, Emmylou Harris, Sandra Bernhard, Dan Akroyd, Brad Paisley, Iggy Pop, Steve Earle, Tom Morello, Daryl Hall , John Oates, Marky Ramone, Lemmy, Tom Kenny, Vince Gill, B.J. Thomas, Howard Stern, Billy F Gibbons, Ranger Doug.<\/p>\n
Now what might they have in common?<\/p>\n
Okay, I left out Snoop Lion and Cheech & Chong, because they might have given it away. Julio Iglesias definitely would have.<\/p>\n
Call me stupid, but I also wasn\u2019t sure if that was Britney Spears up on the screen at the Hard Rock Caf\u00e9 New York, Times Square Thursday night, though I\u2019m pretty sure that was also Rob Halford wishing Willie Nelson a happy 80th birthday video greeting.<\/p>\n
And yes, that\u2019s what they were all doing. Most of them probably came through SiriusXM, which programs the Willie\u2019s Roadhouse channel and promoted the event with ticket giveaways. Many of the videos were clearly taped at Sirius, where the artists were likely guests on other channels and asked to wish Willie happy birthday. Others, like Snoop and Tyler, were filmed on location\u2014and both were very funny.<\/p>\n
I left out Willie\u2019s harp player Mickey Raphael because that would have given it away, too, but he had the best line, that if he knew how long he\u2019d be playing with Willie, he\u2019d have learned how to play a real instrument. But everyone up there\u2014and I\u2019m sure I missed a few\u2014were clearly touched by the occasion, and that\u2019s really the wonder of Willie Nelson: Unlike any other artist other than fellow Highwayman Johnny Cash, Willie cuts across all boundaries, i.e., music genre, politics, age and any other population demographic.<\/p>\n
He looks the same as he has for the last 40 years at least. Sounds the same. Does the same set. He likes farmers. He used the Hard Rock to raise money for the Animal Welfare Institute and the Biodiesel Alliance.<\/p>\n
Most of all he likes \u201cplaying music with my friends.\u201d What better can be said about anyone?<\/p>\n
The event, by the way, brought four generations of Nelson\u2019s together under the heading The Family Nelson & Willie, namely, the Paula Nelson Band (led by Willie’s daughter), the Raelyn Nelson Band (led by his granddaughter), Lukas Nelson and the Promise of the Real featuring Willie Nelson (Lukas is Willie’s son), Insects Vs Robots (featuring Willie\u2019s son Micah Nelson), Folk Uke (with his daughter Amy Nelson) and Lechuza (with his granddaughter Martha Jewelle Fowler).<\/p>\n
All did their patriarch proud.<\/p>\n
Jim Bessman<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
WILLIE NELSON Consider this most varied grouping: Barbra Streisand, Sheryl Crow, Kris Kristofferson, Tony Bennett, Bono, John Mayer, Elvis Costello, Cyndi Lauper, Steven Tyler, Paul Anka, Carlos Santana, Sharon Osbourne, Ozzy Osbourne, Emmylou Harris, Sandra Bernhard, Dan Akroyd, Brad Paisley, Iggy Pop, Steve Earle, Tom Morello, Daryl Hall , John Oates, Marky Ramone, Lemmy, Tom […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4976],"tags":[6699,5553,5330,5762,1963,958,6703,6689,6695,2944,1070,2737,6700,1984,1674,2404,6704,3869,6697,6696,2280,6691,6701,6694,6732,1197,6702,2417,6690,6698,2727,3674,2822,2005],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10062"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10062"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10062\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10065,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10062\/revisions\/10065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10062"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10062"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mmusicmag.com\/m\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10062"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}