Usher, Mary J. Blige, Gwen Stefani, Common, Fall Out Boy and Train all performed during the free Global Citizen 2015 Earth Day rally hosted by will.i.am and Soledad O’Brien.
After suffering a fracture in his foot, Usher was in a cast but drew big cheers when he got his dance on anyway. He sang his hits, including “Yeah!” and “OMG” and also teamed up with Common to sing the beginning of “Glory,” the Oscar-winning song from the movie “Selma.”
“To end poverty, it starts, in my opinion, with an education about it,” Usher told the crowd. “I want you to go and investigate for yourself so that you can really understand what’s going on.”
The rally was a joint initiative of the Global Poverty Project and Earth Day Network. It coincides with meetings at the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. Usher joined the poverty project at the White House on Friday for a meeting with officials.
“I felt really good that the issues we are addressing here are on the table,” he told The Associated Press. After his performance, Usher said his passion is expanding education to help end poverty. But the impacts of climate change also have severe impacts on the world’s poor, he said.
“Global warming is something that obviously will affect all of us. Clean water and sanitation is something that is very real,” he said. “I understand and cannot turn a blind eye to what’s going on.”
For his part, will.i.am played host and said the huge turnout shows people are concerned.
“What I hope happens post the concert is that people go out and talk about some of the issues that we were spelling out today,” he said. “Talk about solutions, go online, dig deep and hold our leaders accountable for some of the things that they’re pledging.”