Every September in Manhattan's largest park, thousands gather for the Global Citizen Festival, a free, ticketed concert and charity event that draws performers like Alicia Keys, Stevie Wonder, and John Mayer. This year, the celebrities involved are larger than life: Beyoncé and Pearl Jam will be performing, and Malala Yousafzai and Stephen Colbert will be there as well. The gathering, this year on September 26, is all to raise awareness of and help fight poverty, inequality, and climate change throughout the world.
Timed to coincide with the meeting of the General Assembly of the United Nations, the list of hosts for the festival reads like an A-list roll call: Scandal star Kerry Washington, Salma Hayek Pinault, Olivia Wilde, Hugh Jackman, Leonardo DiCaprio, Bono, and many more all taking the stage. “I am honored and thrilled to join Global Citizen in urging world leaders to commit to ending extreme poverty,” Colbert said in a statement. “Finally, all that U.N. traffic will have a purpose!”
To help further their goals, Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and other global leaders will also be on hand to spread their message, as well as noted philanthropic business leaders like Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Richard Branson, and Bill and Melinda Gates. Hopefully the stage can hold that much star power when they all gather together to help shine a light on the launch of an ambitious set of global development goals.
Other headliners for this year's concert? Coldplay, Ed Sheeran, Common, and Indian singer Sunidhi Chauhan.
To spread their message far and wide, tickets to the Global Citizen Festival are free, but limited. Luckily, the event will air on MSNBC and stream on both iHeartRadio and Tidal from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. EDT. , right this way.
