All-star performances celebrating David Suzuki’s milestone birthday to be streamed live throughout Canada
VANCOUVER | TRADITIONAL, UNCEDED TERRITORIES OF THE xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (MUSQUEAM), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (SQUAMISH) AND səlilwətaɬ (TSLEIL-WAUTUTH) FIRST NATIONS, May 19, 2026 — The David Suzuki Foundation announces David Suzuki’s 90th birthday benefit concert, Legacy: A Celebration of David Suzuki at 90, in concert with Vancity, taking place on Friday, May 22, at Vancouver’s Queen Elizabeth Theatre, will now feature a national live stream, allowing audiences throughout Canada to participate in this historic celebration.
The event, presented in partnership with Vancity, honours David Suzuki’s milestone birthday and his lifelong dedication to the planet. Artists and speakers participating in the live stream include Bruce Cockburn, Tara Cullis, Jane Fonda, Al Gore, Rick Hansen, Chantal Kreviazuk, Janelle Lapointe, Sarah McLachlan, Danny Michel, William Prince, Sam Roberts Band, Snotty Nose Rez Kids, Suzanne Simard, George Stroumboulopoulos, David Suzuki, Tanya Tagaq Trio, Uzume Taiko and Tia Wood.
“We know many people want to attend David’s birthday benefit in person but can’t,” said David Suzuki Foundation executive director Pierre Iachetti. “So, we’re offering the next best thing: the whole show live online.”
The David Suzuki Foundation is committed to accessibility and inclusion. The concert live stream opens the experience to many more people from all over. Details about how to RSVP for the virtual experience are available at https://davidsuzuki.org/legacy-concert/. Registration will be required (donation optional) to receive the event link. The show will air at 7 p.m. PDT; viewers are encouraged to check their time zone.
Tickets to the in-person event start at $259 plus tax. To buy tickets, visit https://show.ps/l/36825796-1/. All event proceeds support the David Suzuki Foundation so it can continue its work protecting nature, curbing climate change and creating resilient communities.
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For more information and media pass requests, please contact: dsf@ninepointagency.com
- Note: David Suzuki and Pierre Iachetti are available for select interviews on request; opportunities for interviews with select talent may be available to accredited media outlets.
The David Suzuki Foundation is a Canadian environmental non-profit organization, founded in 1990. We operate in English and French, with offices in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal. We aim to collaborate with many different people in Canada, including Indigenous leadership and communities, all governments, businesses and individuals to find solutions to create a sustainable Canada through scientific research, traditional ecological knowledge, innovative policy and legal solutions, communications and public engagement. Our mission is to protect nature’s diversity and the wellbeing of all life, now and for the future. We envision a world where we all act every day on the understanding that we are interdependent with nature and each other.
Vancity is a values-based financial co-operative serving the needs of its 588,000 member-owners and their communities, with offices and more than 60 branches located in Metro Vancouver and Squamish, the Fraser Valley, the Sunshine Coast, the Vancouver and Gulf Islands and Alert Bay, within the territories of the Coast Salish and Kwakwaka’wakw Peoples. With $41 billion in assets plus assets under administration, Vancity is Canada’s largest credit union. Vancity uses its assets to help improve the financial wellbeing of its members while helping to develop healthy communities that are socially, economically and environmentally sustainable.
David Suzuki is a grandfather, scientist, former host of CBC’s The Nature of Things, emeritus professor at the University of British Columbia and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation. Through radio, television and more than 55 books, he has communicated about humanity’s collective impact on the natural world, which now threatens the future of human life. Among his many accolades, Suzuki has been conferred with more than 30 honorary degrees from universities in Canada, the United States and Australia. He has been honoured with adoptions and names from eight Indigenous nations in Canada and Australia.
Bruce Cockburn has enjoyed an illustrious career shaped by politics, spirituality and musical diversity. His remarkable journey has seen him embrace folk, jazz, rock and worldbeat styles while earning high praise as a prolific, inspired songwriter and accomplished guitarist. He remains deeply respected for his activism and humanist song lyrics that thread throughout his career. On all his albums, Cockburn has deftly captured the joy, pain, fear and faith of human experience in song. Cockburn has won 13 Juno Awards, an induction into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, a Governor General’s Performing Arts Award and has been made an Officer of the Order of Canada, among many other accolades. He has 22 gold and platinum records including a six-times platinum record for his Christmas album. Cockburn continues to tour internationally.
Tara Cullis is an award-winning author, activist and president of the David Suzuki Foundation. She has been a key player in environmental movements in the Amazon, Southeast Asia, Japan and British Columbia. She co-founded the David Suzuki Foundation with David Suzuki “to collaborate with people in Canada from all walks of life, to conserve our environment and to find solutions that will create a sustainable Canada through science-based research, education and policy work.”
Jane Fonda is a two-time Academy Award-winning actor, producer, author, activist and fitness guru. Her career has spanned over 50 years, accumulating a body of film work that includes more than 50 films and significant contributions to political causes such as women’s rights, Indigenous rights and environmental protection. She is a seven-time Golden Globe winner and was honoured with the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2021. She accepted the Harry Belafonte Voices for Social Justice Award at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival. In April 2024, Fonda accepted the TIME magazine Earth Award. She also received the SAG Life Achievement Award in February 2025.
Al Gore, former vice-president of the United States, is the founder and chairman of The Climate Reality Project, a non-profit devoted to solving the climate crisis, a founding partner and chairman of Generation Investment Management and a co-founder of Climate TRACE. He is also a partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, a member of the World Economic Forum’s board of trustees and a past member of the board of directors at Apple.
Rick Hansen, C.C., O.B.C., six-time Paralympic medallist, is a Canadian icon best known as the “Man In Motion” for undertaking an epic 26-month, 40,000-kilometre journey around the world in his wheelchair. He is the founder of the Rick Hansen Foundation, an organization committed to inspire, create and deliver innovative solutions that accelerate a global movement to remove barriers to inclusion for people with disabilities.
Chantal Kreviazuk made her critically acclaimed full-length debut, Under These Rocks and Stones, in 1997. Since then, the Winnipeg-born and internationally celebrated three-times Juno Award and Grammy winning singer-songwriter and musician, classically trained pianist, actor, movie producer, philanthropist, humanitarian and proud wife and mother of three has recorded 10 albums, including a live album, a holiday album and a collaboration with her husband and Our Lady Peace frontman Raine Maida. A prolific songwriter, Kreviazuk has written global smashes for the likes of Drake, Gwen Stefani, Pitbull, Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears, Carrie Underwood, Avril Lavigne, Shakira, Kelly Clarkson and Kendrick Lamar. Equally committed to helping those in need, Kreviazuk was awarded the Order of Canada in 2014 along with Maida, for their efforts to raise awareness and support for human and animal rights, mental health, education and the environment. Kreviazuk has been an ambassador to War Child for more than two decades and one of the organization’s founding artists.
Janelle Lapointe is a climate justice and Indigenous rights organizer from Stellat’en First Nation. She is of mixed Black, Dakelh and French (Québécois) ancestry. Currently, she is a senior adviser at the David Suzuki Foundation and a guest on Treaty 13 territory, the traditional lands of the Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee and Huron-Wendat peoples, as well as the Mississaugas of the Credit. Janelle was previously a regular contributor on CBC Vancouver’s The Early Edition climate panel and is a member of the Indigenous Climate Adaptation Working Group, board member of Common Horizon and Sacred Earth Solar, council member of SevenGen Energy and an instructor of Simon Fraser University’s Foundations in Climate Action course. She leans on her lived experience growing up on a small reserve in northern British Columbia to ensure that intersectionality is at the forefront of environmental narratives, to build power and help others see their stake in fighting back against the status quo.
Sarah McLachlan is one of the most celebrated singer-songwriters in entertainment with over 40 million albums sold worldwide. She has received three Grammy Awards and 12 Juno Awards over her career and has been inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame and the Canadian Songwriter’s Hall of Fame. Sarah’s music embodies the art of songwriting on its most personal level, and her indelible vocals resonate with people everywhere. Her songs have had a profound influence: “Angel,” “Building A Mystery,” “Fallen,” “I Will Remember You,” “Adia,” “Sweet Surrender,” “World On Fire,” “Possession” and countless others are an inspiration to music lovers around the globe.
Danny Michel is a Canadian songwriter and producer who has built a decades-long career on curiosity and creative risk-taking. Blending rock, pop, folk, world and even classical influences, his “musical ADD” has earned him a devoted fan base, multiple Juno and Polaris Prize nominations, CBC’s Heart of Gold award and CFMA honours, including Producer of the Year and the Oliver Schroer Pushing the Boundaries Award. Beyond music, he founded the DM Ocean Academy Fund to support a non-profit high school in Belize and has performed at milestone celebrations for Jane Goodall and David Suzuki, as well as toured with Stuart McLean’s Vinyl Cafe.
William Prince is a songwriter shaped by powerful legacies of family and craft. His perspective is both singular and resonant. His fifth LP, Further From the Country, is a striking work of reflection and ambition, marked by clarity, humanity and emotional depth. The distance travelled on this new album is generational, aspirational and deeply personal. Expansive and declarative, the record finds Prince meeting the challenge of writing enduring songs for an age of uncertainty. A two-time Juno Award winner, Prince continues to build an exceptional body of work, earning the John Prine Songwriter Fellowship and an Americana Honors & Awards nomination. From the Newport Folk Festival to sold-out performances at Massey Hall, from NPR’s Tiny Desk to tours with The War and Treaty and Yola, he has appeared on some of music’s most storied stages. In June 2025, Nipissing University awarded him an honorary Doctor of Letters (honoris causa) recognizing his contributions to music, storytelling and cultural bridge-building.
Sam Roberts Band is an award-winning rock act with over 125 million career streams to date. They maintain their tradition of delivering chart-topping singles, consistently surpassing expectations with their music. Originating from Montreal, the double-platinum-selling band is known for their radio hits since their debut album We Were Born In A Flame, which included hit singles “Brother Down,” “Don’t Walk Away Eileen,” “Hard Road” and “Where Have All The Good People Gone?” Sam Roberts Band continues to release critically acclaimed and fan-loved albums, touring constantly throughout Canada and the world. The band is a perennial favourite and continues to bring new fans into the fold. Their legacy of hit singles is now etched into the Canadian music landscape. Songs such as “We’re All In This Together,” “Bridge to Nowhere,” “Them Kids” and “Picture of Love” continue to be heard on the airwaves, rock and lifestyle playlists and at unforgettable shows.
Suzanne Simard is a professor of forest ecology at the University of British Columbia and leads the Mother Tree Project and Program. Her research — showing that forests are cooperative, connected networks — has revolutionized forest ecology. Her TED Talk has reached millions, and her bestselling book Finding the Mother Tree continues to capture global interest. Named one of TIME’s 100 most influential people in the world in 2024, she champions regenerative forestry rooted in Indigenous knowledge.
Snotty Nose Rez Kids tore into the music scene with an unmistakable talent and an unforgettable name. Showing off their lyrical prowess and natural storytelling ability, Yung Trybez and Young D jumpstarted the band with back-to-back albums in 2017. Their follow up albums, Trapline, Life After God and Im Good, HBU? have solidified their career with greater industry recognition, collecting 13 Western Canadian Music Awards, a Prism Prize award, two Juno nominations and four appearances on the Polaris Prize shortlist. The band has taken their high voltage live show to the road, performing hundreds of shows across six countries. SNRK has gone on to dominate hip-hop music, most recently achieving their biggest milestone, signing to Sony Music. SNRK are blazing their own path, weaving together a musical fabric of hard-hitting lyricism, revealing stories about the struggles they and their people have encountered, empowering protest songs for the frontlines and a humour that keeps even the heaviest of topics something you can vibe to.
George Stroumboulopoulos is a globally renowned storyteller, broadcaster and producer, synonymous with music, television, film and the creative arts in Canada. For more than three decades, he has shaped the national conversation through iconic prime-time news and late-night programs, including CBC’s The Hour and George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight, his interview series on CNN and as anchor of Hockey Night in Canada. He also fronted and produced The Strombo Show on Apple Music, further cementing his reputation as one of the most trusted and influential voices in contemporary culture.
Tanya Tagaq Trio comprises Tanya Tagaq, Jean Martin and Jeffrey Zeigler. Tanya Tagaq is an internationally celebrated artist from Ikaluktutiak (Cambridge Bay, Nunavut). She is an improvisational singer, avant-garde composer and bestselling author. A member of the Order of Canada, Polaris Music Prize and Juno Award winner, and recipient of multiple honorary doctorates, Tagaq is an original disruptor and a world-changing figure at the forefront of seismic social, political and environmental change. Jean Martin is a drummer, multi-instrumentalist and producer based in Toronto, but with a network of collaborators that extends throughout Canada and internationally. He was nominated in 2004 as ‘Best Drummer’ at the National Jazz Awards and received the 2004 Freddy Stone Award for excellence in contemporary music in Canada. As a producer, Jean is best known as the Artistic Director of Barnyard Records. Cellist and multidisciplinary artist Jeffrey Zeigler has a body of work that spans genres, themes, and formats, from solo to opera to chamber and interdisciplinary collaborations. As a member of the internationally-renowned Kronos Quartet from 2005-2013, he is the recipient of the Avery Fisher Prize, the Polar Music Prize, the President’s Merit Award from NARAS (who present the GRAMMY™ Awards), the Richard Bogomolny National Service Award from Chamber Music America, and The Asia Society’s Cultural Achievement Award.
Tia Wood followed her heart from the Saddle Lake Cree Nation rez in central Alberta to the bright lights of Los Angeles to make her musical dreams come true. Her powerful, soulful voice carries the spirit of her peoples’ songs that have echoed from her homelands since time immemorial. Growing up in Treaty 6 territory in a home rich with music and culture, Wood began singing as soon as she could talk, inspired by her parents, siblings and dual Plains Cree and Coast Salish heritage. Her father, Earl Wood, co-founded and was a member of the renowned powwow group Northern Cree, while her mother Cynthia Jim and sister Fawn Wood are also accomplished musicians. These early influences shaped Wood’s artistic path and continue to inform her work today. Her debut songs, including “Losing Game,” “Dirt Roads,” “Sky High,” “Catch and Release” and “Sugar and Cream,” are as eclectic and rich as the young adult experience. With sonically rich vocals and deeply personal storytelling, Tia Wood is carving out a distinctive voice in today’s music landscape.
Uzume Taiko has developed a reputation as one of Canada’s most dynamic performing ensembles. Their repertoire includes a variety of drum-playing styles, exciting rhythms and powerful beats that the audience feels. They create new cross-cultural taiko music by combining the festival drumming style from Japan with contributions from various musicians and artists. Uzume Taiko has performed in all corners of Canada, from the Arctic to both coasts and many points in between. The group has toured their evening concerts, festival and youth shows across North America, the United Kingdom and Europe. The troupe leads taiko drum workshops in schools and communities for people of all ages, for health and wellness.