The story behind the George Michael’s No.1 Hit “Jesus To A Child”
The song entered the UK charts directly to No.1 on this day in 1996
The story behind the George Michael’s No.1 Hit “Jesus To A Child”
Included on his 3rd solo album, “Older”, released in 1996, “Jesus To A Child” was George Michael’s first self-penned hit in his homeland for almost four years. the song was a melancholy tribute to Michael’s Brazilian lover Anselmo Feleppa, who died from an AIDS-related brain hemorrhage. Michael had been unable to write for the next 18 months as a consequence of his grief but then penned the words to “Jesus To A Child” in little more than an hour, indicating that the time was right to move on with his life. The exact identity of the song’s subject and the nature of their relationship was cause for a certain amount of innuendo at the time, as Michael had not confirmed his homosexuality and did not do so until 1998. On January 29th, 1996, “Jesus To A Child” became his first solo single to enter the UK chart at number one. On the United States’ Billboard Hot 100 it became the highest new entry, at number 7, by a British artist for more than 25 years and at number 2 in the mainland European charts. George Michael would consistently dedicate the song to Feleppa before performing it live throughout the rest of his career. After his death on December 25th, 2016, Dame Esther Rantzen, founder of the charity ChildLine, revealed that Michael had secretly donated all of the single’s royalties to the charity; also several charity institutions and anonymous citizens stated how they were helped by George Michael either financially or by having song royalties donated directly to institutions, during his lifetime, the singer and composer never publicized or talked about it publicly and always asked the ones who knew, including the people he helped, to keep silent about it.
Look back at the 1996 music video for the song “Jesus To A Child” by George Michael
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