Musician Nile Rodgers’ charitable foundation, We Are Family, was founded in the wake of 9/11.
“Three of my friends were on the first plane that crashed into the World Trade Center,” he told Page Six exclusively before a performance at the Soho Sessions on Thursday night.
One of those friends was photographer Berry Berenson, who was married to “Psycho” star Anthony Perkins from 1973 to 1992. Rodgers lived next door to the couple in Greenwich Village.
The “Le Freak” singer, 72, said that he started the charity after the tragedy because he wanted to be involved with something “that I thought would be effective.”
We Are Family, which he founded with his longtime partner Nancy Hunt, focuses on funding and mentoring activists under the age of 30. It has funded over a dozen schools in Mali, Malawi, Nicaragua, and Nepal, and is currently planting a forest in Ireland to offset his band’s carbon consumption.
Rodgers co-founded Chic with Bernard Edwards and had a string of hits, including “Le Freak” and “Good Times.”
After Chic’s breakup, he worked with a who’s who of performers, including Madonna, Diana Ross, Daft Punk, Beyoncé, Lady Gaga and Mick Jagger.
But the Grammy winner admitted he has a soft spot for David Bowie, with whom he collaborated on the late singer’s 1983 “Let’s Dance” album.
“David really saved me at a time when the whole industry sort of turned against us,” he shared, referencing the anti-disco era that sprung up in the early ’80s. “We were making nothing but number one records, one right after the other, and then this whole ‘Disco Sucks’ thing happened.”
“And because we didn’t exist before disco, we were totally associated with disco.”
Rodgers later performed for a packed crowd at the event, including celebs Elvis Costello, Gina Gershon, Steve Buscemi, Don Lemon, Christopher Meloni and Michelle Buteau.
The Soho Sessions, founded by Greg Williamson and Nicole Rechter, brings performers to an intimate space in lower Manhattan to perform and highlight a cause dear to their hearts.
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