<\/p>\n
Elton John, who has released over 30 studio albums, said his next one was written unlike any other he\u2019s created before. He described the new LP as being \u201cso happy\u201d at a gala event over the weekend, where he was honored with the Glenn Gould Prize in Toronto.<\/p>\n
John said the vision loss he suffered from an eye infection in 2024 made it necessary that he approach songwriting differently after all these decades.<\/p>\n
More from Rolling Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve had eye trouble recently and I always make records by looking at lyrics and writing to lyrics, and so I\u2019m kind of fucked at the moment,\u201d the 79-year-old singer-pianist said on Saturday at the Theatre at Great Canadian Casino Resort in Toronto, where he accepted the prestigious Glenn Gould Prize. The international award honors a person who has made \u201ca unique lifetime contribution that has enriched the human condition through the arts.\u201d<\/p>\n John \u2014 who retired from touring in 2023<\/a> after playing over 330 shows all over the world on his Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour, and released the collaborative album Who Believes in Angels?\u00a0<\/a><\/em>with Brandi Carlile last year \u2014 added, \u201cWhat my eye has given me is a chance of, at 80 years of age, completely reversing how I write. I\u2019m writing melodies first, and lyrics coming second. I\u2019ve never done that. \u00a0And I\u2019ve just done it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAnd I\u2019ve just done an album, which is so different to anything I\u2019ve ever done before, but it\u2019s so happy,\u201d he continued. \u201cI\u2019m so thrilled with it because it\u2019s given me another chance to make music.\u201d<\/p>\n John contracted a severe eye infection\u00a0in the summer of 2024. That September, he posted publicly about it for the first time, revealing<\/a> he has \u201conly limited vision in one eye\u201d and \u201cit will take some time before sight returns to the impacted eye.\u201d<\/p>\n A little over a year later, in an interview with Variety<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>he said, \u201cIt\u2019s been devastating. Because I lost my right eye and my left eye\u2019s not so good, the last 15 months have been challenging for me because I haven\u2019t been able to see anything, watch anything, read anything.\u201d<\/p>\n So, news that he has found a way to adapt creatively and that a new solo album is in the can was music to fans\u2019 ears at the gala. \u201cIf I don\u2019t make music, I\u2019m dead,\u201d he told the audience. \u201cIf don\u2019t listen to music, I\u2019m dead. Music is my soul, my driving force. It is everything and has been everything to me all my life.\u201d<\/p>\n Glenn Gould Prize recipients receive $100,000, which John donated back to the Glenn Gould Foundation. The honor also comes with the opportunity to choose the winner of the Glenn Gould Prot\u00e9g\u00e9 Prize of $25,000. \u00a0He picked mezzo soprano Emily D\u2019Angelo. \u201cI know a star when I see one,\u201d he said. \u00a0You\u2019re an immaculate performer, an immaculate singer and I\u2019m so proud to be giving you this award.\u201d<\/p>\n John also seized the moment in his six-minute speech to praise Canada and take a dig at Trump. \u201cIt\u2019s so nice to be in Canada and have a concert for Canadian artists, who all I know. It\u2019s also nice to be in a country that has common sense,\u201d he said to hoots and claps.<\/p>\n \u201cI have a family, here.\u00a0 David [Furnish], my husband, his family are my family. They live in Toronto. They\u2019re part of my life. They\u2019re part of my soul. My children, they love it here so much. They love their cousins and their family here. It is part of my life. I am a Canadian,\u201d he added, to even more applause.<\/p>\n He continued: \u201cAnd I can tell you, it\u2019s not the fucking 51st state, either.\u201d That was met with an even louder and longer cheers. \u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s a country that has accepted immigrants and does not throw them out.\u00a0 It\u2019s a country that embraces all sorts of people, all races, and I love it, and I can\u2019t thank you Canada enough for everything they\u2019ve ever done for me.\u201d<\/p>\n John then surprised everyone by getting up from his chair on the stage to join all the Canadian performers he handpicked for the night for the grand finale of \u201cGoodbye Yellow Brick Road.\u201d<\/p>\n Best of Rolling Stone<\/strong><\/p>\n Sign up for RollingStone’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Elton John, who has released over 30 studio albums, said his next one was written unlike any other he\u2019s created before. He described the new LP as being \u201cso happy\u201d at a gala event over the weekend, where he was honored with the Glenn Gould Prize in Toronto. John said the vision loss he suffered […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2414532,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[22650,373852,472547],"class_list":["post-2414531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-elton-john","tag-eye-infection","tag-glenn-gould-prize"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Elton-John-Says-New-Album-Is-Unlike-Any-Hes-Previously.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2414531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2414531"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2414531\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2414533,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2414531\/revisions\/2414533"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2414532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2414531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2414531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2414531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}