How George Michael Changed Music Forever, with Sathnam Sanghera (Part Two)

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**Mia Sorenti** (1:30)
A brief content warning. This episode contains some mature themes and offensive language.
Welcome to Intelligence Squared, where great minds meet. I'm Senior Producer Mia Sorenti.
What can the life of George Michael tell us about music, identity, politics and modern Britain? In this episode, we return for part 2 of our live event with award-winning journalist and author, Sathnam Sanghera. Sanghera joined us recently at Union Chapel to discuss the life and legacy of George Michael, looking beyond just his music to explore his immigrant family background, his political convictions and the activism that shaped him and his legacy. He was in conversation with journalist, broadcaster and author, Jenny Kleeman. If you haven't heard part 1 yet, we recommend jumping back an episode to catch up. But now let's return to the conversation live at Union Chapel in London.

**Jenny Kleeman** (2:26)
What would you like non-fans, the non-previously converted to feel about George Michael, given all of the research that you've done and all of the thought you've put into this?

**Sathnam Sanghera** (2:38)
Well, we've talked about some of the things like his philanthropy, the way he came out, his boldness in his politics. But actually, it's the music, isn't it? He was a fantastic auteur, meaning there's so many of his most famous songs, he did everything on. I think people realize this, like on a song like Last Christmas, he produced it, wrote it, sang it, played everything. The engineer, Chris Porter, asked quietly if he could play the sleigh bells. And George was like, no. They're mine. No, I'm playing everything. And it's so many different corner, he did everything on that, everything she wants, he did everything on that. I don't think people realize that. That's an incredible thing to have done. On top of that, the songs have just lasted, man. I mean, some of the songs were written 40 years ago. I mean, I did an event at a school where I had to go to talk to kids about the British Empire and they were like, oh, what are you working on next? And I said, oh, you won't care, I've written a book about this pop star called George Michael. The book is called Tonight, the Music Seems So Loud. And they sang Careless Whisper, Back at Me, 10 Year Olds. And that's because that song is massive on social media. They're too young to be on social media, but the music is still out there. It's alive. It's not just that, it's Father Figure, it's Last Christmas. The songs are everywhere. And also The Voiceman, more than anything else.
I just think he had one of the best voices in the history of pop music. I think it's up there with Marvingay, Aretha Franklin, I thought with Mariah further down.
It's one of the best voices ever. And it was the way it captured so much.
Very few of his songs are purely happy or purely sad. They're usually both. So Last Christmas is a very good example.
It's been covered hundreds of times and none of the covers are any good. And there's a reason for that. It's because they lack George's vocals.