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Billie Eilish Headlining Climate Concert at Eiffel Tower

FILE - This Nov. 2, 2019 file photo shows singer Billie Eilish at the 2019 LACMA Art and Film Gala in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)
FILE - This Nov. 2, 2019 file photo shows singer Billie Eilish at the 2019 LACMA Art and Film Gala in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)
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Billie Eilish Headlining Climate Concert at Eiffel Tower

FILE - This Nov. 2, 2019 file photo shows singer Billie Eilish at the 2019 LACMA Art and Film Gala in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)
FILE - This Nov. 2, 2019 file photo shows singer Billie Eilish at the 2019 LACMA Art and Film Gala in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP, File)

Billie Eilish, Lenny Kravitz and Jon Batiste are headlining a concert aimed at building awareness around climate at the foot of the Eiffel Tower in Paris on Thursday.

The concert, organized by NGO Global Citizen, features on the sidelines of an international summit launched by President Emmanuel Macron, said AFP.

Artists H.E.R. and Eilish's brother Finneas are also on the bill for the free show at the Champ de Mars below the Parisian landmark.

The venue hosted a previous Global Citizen concert in 2021 with Elton John and other huge stars that also had parallel concerts in several cities around the world.

Eilish, 21 and a seven-time Grammy winner, is known for her environmental advocacy.

She has given up the use of private jets and during her 2022 "Happier Than Ever" tour, she set up "eco villages" to encourage recycling, voter-registration and provide information on environmental groups.

Thursday's concert, titled "Power our Planet: Live in Paris", seeks to build pressure for a "new global financial pact".

It wants rich countries to keep promises for climate-related funding to poorer nations, reform development banks to focus on the environment, and get commitments from large polluting companies to move towards net-zero emissions.

"Crises are multiplying and the number of those who place their hope in peace and multilateralism will only grow if we, as a global community, demonstrate that we are there to help the most vulnerable," Macron said in a statement.

The stars will perform a series of short sets for around 20,000 spectators who won a lottery for free tickets.

It will also be broadcast online via multiple sites.

Actresses including Oscar-winner Michelle Yeoh will also be present to speak during the event.

 

 

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UK Blues Legend John Mayall Dead at 90 

English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)
English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)
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UK Blues Legend John Mayall Dead at 90 

English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)
English blues singer John Mayall performs with his band The Bluesbreakers, on the stage of the Miles Davis hall during the 42nd Montreux Jazz Festival in Montreux, Switzerland, late Monday, July 7, 2008. (AP)

John Mayall, the British blues pioneer whose 1960s music collective the Bluesbreakers helped usher in a fertile period of rock and brought guitarists like Eric Clapton to prominence, has died at 90, his family said Tuesday.

Mayall, a singer and multi-instrumentalist who was dubbed "the godfather of British blues," and whose open-door arrangement saw some of the greats in the genre hone their craft with him and his band, "passed away peacefully in his California home" on Monday, according to a statement posted on his Facebook page.

It did not state a cause of death.

"Health issues that forced John to end his epic touring career have finally led to peace for one of this world's greatest road warriors," it said. "John Mayall gave us 90 years of tireless efforts to educate, inspire and entertain."

Mayall's influence on 1960s rock and beyond is enormous. Members of the Bluesbreakers eventually went on to join or form groups including Cream, Fleetwood Mac, the Rolling Stones and many more.

At age 30, Mayall moved to London from northern England in 1963. Sensing revolution in the air, he gave up his profession as a graphic designer to embrace a career in blues, the musical style born in Black America.

He teamed up with a series of young guitarists including Clapton, Peter Green, later of Fleetwood Mac, and Mick Taylor who helped form the Rolling Stones.

In the Bluesbreakers' debut album in 1966, "Blues Breakers With Eric Clapton," John Mayall enthralled music aficionados with a melding of soulful rock and gutsy, guitar-driven American blues featuring covers of tunes by Robert Johnson, Otis Rush and Ray Charles.

The blues music he was playing in British venues was "a novelty for white England," he told AFP in 1997.

That album was a hit, catapulting Clapton to stardom and bringing a wave of popularity to a more raw and personal blues music.

Mayall moved to California in 1968 and toured America extensively in 1972.

He recorded a number of landmark albums in the 1960s including "Crusade," "A Hard Road," and "Blues From Laurel Canyon." Dozens more followed in the 1970s and up to his latest, "The Sun Is Shining Down," in 2022.

Mayall was awarded an OBE, an Officer of the Order of the British Empire, in 2005.