Grammys 2022: ‘Love For Sale’ Was Tony Bennett’s Vision, According to Lady Gaga
Lady Gaga and Tony Bennett‘s collaborative jazz album Love For Sale is nominated for six Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year. The unlikely duo has forged a strong bond by performing and collaborating on several projects throughout the years. When the Grammy nominations were announced in November of 2021, Gaga was overcome with emotion. In a lengthy social media post, she expressed gratitude for the love the project received from the Recording Academy. Gaga also shared that her collaborator deserves the credit for Love for Sale.
‘Love For Sale’ was Tony Bennett’s vision
When the Grammy nominations were announced, Lady Gaga took to her personal Instagram. There, she honored her good friend and frequent collaborator, Tony Bennett, in an emotional post.
“Thank you so much to the @RecordingAcademy for these 6 nominations for Love For Sale. I am stunned and shocked and beyond grateful.”
At a loss for words, she wrote “I don’t know what to say. I just keep crying and am utterly speechless.”
Besides Album of the Year, Love For Sale is also nominated for the Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album. The track “I Get A Kick Out of You” garnered nominations for Best Music Video, Best Pop Duo/Group Performance, and Record Of The Year.
She continued, “This means so much to me, @itstonybennett, the Bennetts, my family, jazz music, and the great Cole Porter who wrote all these timeless classics.”
The twelve time Grammy winner then credited Bennett as the mastermind behind their 2021 release, Love For Sale. “This album happened because it was Tony’s idea and I made him a promise that we would make it and we did.”
Tony Bennett’s battle with Alzheimer’s
At 95 years old, Tony Bennett‘s Love For Sale earned him six Grammy Award nominations. It will most likely be the singers final project.
In August of 2021, Bennett retired from the limelight. He perfomed one last show at Radio City Music Hall in his hometown of New York City. The legend sang seventeen songs to a sold-out crowd. It was his first time performing since his family revealed he had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in February of 2021.
Lady Gaga was beside him on stage; Just as she was with him during the recording of Love For Sale, the duo’s follow-up to their first album collaboration, Cheek to Cheek. Bennett was diagnosed around the time of recording.
According to AARP, “music is remarkably therapeutic for Alzheimer’s patients in that it’s been known to miraculously, though temporarily, retie the broken threads of memory.”
Gayatri Devi, Bennett’s neurologist, said that performing “kept him on his toes and also stimulated his brain in a significant way.”
Lady Gaga says she’s ‘honored’ to be Tony Bennett’s ‘companion in music and his friend’
The music icons first collaborated on Bennett’s album Duets II in 2011, singing “The Lady Is a Tramp.”
In 2014, they recorded an entire album of jazz standards, Cheek to Cheek. It debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, and Love For Sale debuted at No. 8.
Gaga praised Bennett in her Instagram post, “I’m so honored to be his companion in music and his friend.”
She shared his understanding of the nominations, “I’ll never forget today and congratulating Tony on his 6 nominations. I’ll never forget that today he could track every word I was saying and understood the world was celebrating him and celebrating jazz.”
“Thank you to the public for loving us, we surely love each other, and you.”
She concluded, “Believe in love and partnership, even with 60 years between us, and Alzheimer’s, there is nothing like the magic of music. I love you Tony, and the world loves you too. How could they not?”
