Key Takeaways
- Stevie Wonder accompanied his 13-year-old daughter Zaiah on piano as she sang John Lennon’s “Imagine” for roughly 17,000 fans at Amsterdam’s Ziggo Dome.
- Wonder introduced the performance by calling out unnamed global leaders and urging them to “Make love great again.”
- The Songs in the Key of Life anniversary show also featured eldest daughter Aisha on backing vocals, a tribute to her role in inspiring “Isn’t She Lovely,” and a “Superstition” finale.
Stevie Wonder gave one of the night’s biggest moments to his daughter, Zaiah, during his Songs in the Key of Life anniversary show in Amsterdam. With her father beside her at the piano, Zaiah led the Ziggo Dome through John Lennon’s “Imagine”—turning a massive arena concert into a strikingly intimate family performance.
The duet followed Wonder’s blunt assessment of the world beyond the venue. The 76-year-old musician voiced concern about unnamed global leaders, telling them, “You know who you are,” before offering his own twist on a familiar political slogan: “Make love great again.” That set the stage for Zaiah to sing Lennon’s 1971 call for peace in front of approximately 17,000 people.
Zaiah, Wonder’s eighth child and his older daughter with wife Tomeeka Robyn Bracy, has already begun building a musical history with her father. She was one of five Wonder children featured on his 2020 single “Where Is Our Love Song” and later performed with her younger sister Nyah at his House Full of Toys benefit concert.
Amsterdam, however, put her in a far bigger spotlight: one voice, one piano and an arena listening.
The moment also extended the family story running through Songs in the Key of Life. Before “Isn’t She Lovely,” Wonder displayed photos of all nine of his children and introduced the song by discussing eldest daughter Aisha, whose 1975 birth inspired the track.
Her cries and bath-time splashing appear on the original recording. “That was emotion stuck in a moment, and that can never, ever be taken away,” Wonder said, per People.
Fifty years later, Aisha was onstage as one of her father’s backing vocalists while Zaiah took the lead on another classic.
The Diamond-certified double album remains his biggest-selling release and completed his historic run of three consecutive Album of the Year wins, following Innervisions and Fulfillingness’ First Finale.
Backed by an army of strings, horns, percussionists, keyboardists and singers, Wonder preserved the album’s scale while refusing to perform it on autopilot. “Sir Duke” charged directly into “I Wish,” an instrumental passage slipped into Michael Jackson’s “Billie Jean,” and extended solos repeatedly pulled the songs away from their studio versions.
“Black Man” ended with raised fists across the stage, while “Another Star” recruited the entire arena as a 17,000-person choir.
Wonder then stepped outside the album to close with “Superstition.”
