Biden hosts 2023 Kennedy Heart honorees at White Home

President Biden welcomed the 2023 Kennedy Heart honorees on the White Home on Sunday.

The Kennedy Heart honors a choose group of individuals yearly for his or her inventive influences on American tradition. This yr’s honorees are Billy Crystal, Renée Fleming, Barry Gibb, Queen Latifah, and Dionne Warwick.

CBS will air The forty sixth Annual Kennedy Heart Honors on Wednesday, Dec. 27.

At Sunday’s reception, Biden spoke on the significance of the performing arts.

“Performing arts is extra than simply sound,” he mentioned. “They replicate who we’re as People. And as human beings. That is very true for greater than 200 Kennedy Heart Honorees over the previous 46 years for helps form, how we see ourselves, how we see one another, and the way we see our world honors not simply primarily based on the size of the profession, the scope of the work of heightened fame, however due to their distinctive place within the conscience, and the very soul of our dynamic and numerous nation.”

The president listed the prolonged accomplishments of every honoree, calling Crystal somebody who “makes everybody cease and snort,” and mentioned that Fleming has a voice of “pure gold,” noting that she carried out at a non-public mass for his household earlier than his inauguration.

Biden additionally praised the music and household bond shared by the Bee Gees, represented by Gibb, the final surviving member of the trio of brothers, and known as rapper Queen Latifah a “pure storyteller” and certainly one of a number of Black artists “utilizing their artwork to interrupt down boundaries.”

Lastly, he spoke of Warwick’s accomplishments as a singer, highlighting her spectacular profession and the quite a few awards she’s received over time.

“Her voice and coronary heart make us really feel one thing deep inside ourselves,” he mentioned.

Under are pictures from this yr’s forty sixth Kennedy Heart Honors gala: