Some 800 people gathered at Temple Sholom in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Wednesday night to honor musical artist Boy George for his public support of Israel and the Jewish community following the Hamas-led terrorist attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
For the first time in public, the 65-year-old British singer performed “We Will Dance Again,” his tribute to those murdered at the Nova music festival.
The singer also joined Rabbi Dan Moskovitz, senior rabbi at the synagogue, on stage for a conversation about the inspiration behind his song and the backlash to its release.
Moskovitz said he has been listening to the artist since he was a teenager in the 1980s, “first on my Walkman, then on my Discman.”
He asked Boy George why he chose the title of the song.
“I went to the Nova Exhibit,” he answered. “I’ve done festivals in Israel. I’ve done festivals all over the world. So it was like walking into my world.”
“I walked into that room they’d set up, and I was like, ‘Oh, my God, I’ve been here, I know what this is,’” he said. He met a Nova survivor and told her he was going to write a song.
“She looked at me like I was mad,” Boy George said. “When I wrote it, it just kind of came.” He described crying while recording the song.
During the performance at the synagogue, the audience cheered after the lyric, “I stand with the Jews.”
Boy George told the crowd that as someone whose mother is Irish, “it’s been a real shock to me that the Irish people are so antisemitic.”
“People have said to me, ‘Oh, your mother would be ashamed of you,’ I’m like, ‘No. My mother would be proud of me,’” he said.
The musical artist also performed his Culture Club hit “Karma Chameleon.”
After the music, the rabbi presented Boy George with an inscribed shofar. He also recited the Shehechiyanu, a blessing to celebrate an action done for the first time.
