Lady Gaga celebrates Tony Bennett’s birthday after his death

Lady Gaga celebrated the late singer Tony Bennett’s birthday on Thursday.

In an Instagram post, the Born This Way hitmaker remembered the late I Left My Heart In San Francisco singer in honour of his birthday.

“Happy Birthday Tony. August 3rd is Tony Bennett Day. A day for smiling. But I’ll be celebrating you a lot more than once a year,” she captioned two photos of herself posing in a black gown by a hot dog truck in New York City. “I’ll celebrate you every time I’m on stage singing jazz music, every time I’m with your family, every time I walk down the streets of New York I’ll look around and remember all you did for this city and the whole world.”

Tony – who would have been 97 years old on Thursday – died on 21 July following a battle with Alzheimer’s disease.

Several days after his death, Lady Gaga, whose real name is Stefani Germanotta, paid tribute to her friend and collaborator.

“I will miss my friend forever. I will miss singing with him, recording with him, talking with him, being on stage together,” she captioned an Instagram post at the time. “With Tony, I got to live my life in a time warp. Tony & I had this magical power.”

Alongside a photo of herself and the late singer hugging, she continued, “We transported ourselves to another era, modernized the music together, & gave it all new life as a singing duo.”

Tony and Gaga collaborated on the 2014 album Cheek to Cheek and 2021 follow-up Love for Sale, for which they won Grammys for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album.

The U.S. Senate passed a resolution earlier this week declaring 3 August as Tony Bennett Day.