Jennifer Lopez & Lin-Manuel Miranda are making the world go round…
The 46-year-old Puerto Rican singer/actress and the 36-year-old Broadway star performed their new peace anthem entitled “Love Make the World Go Round,” inspired by the Orlando Shooting, on Today on Monday morning.
The track, made available for download on July 7 on iTunes, benefits the Hispanic Federation‘s Proyecto Somos Orlando initiative, which “will address the long-term needs for mental health services that are culturally competent and bilingual.
The initiative will enable care to be delivered to those affected directly in the communities in which they live. Beyond emergency assistance, they will be provided with case management, crisis intervention and mental health services, among other needs.
Fifty survivors and family members of the victims of the Orlando tragedy were present in the Rockefeller Plaza crowd for the performance.
Beginning with a clip of the Hamilton creator’s “Love is love” speech at the Tony Awards, the dance track features Miranda rapping about peace and love (“A generation of innovators enabled to patiently wait for change ’cause change is what they’ve been afraid of / the malevolence can wait, raise a level of debate, celebrate, elevate”) while Lopez sings the titular line to ring in the chorus: “We’re not staying inside today / they’re not taking our pride away.”
How did the song come to be? Lopez explained on Today that she’s had the song for eight months, but “when everything happened in Orlando, I heard it in a different way for the first time. I was like, ‘The world needs this right now. The world really needs the message of love being the answer. That’s what really matters; that’s what really makes the world go round, nothing else. Hate, anger, it’s not gonna get us anywhere.'” She then approached Miranda about rapping on the bridge of the track.
