Gloria Gaynor sings to Texas’ Harvey victims: ‘You will survive’

Music
Aug. 31, 2017, 8:50 a.m.

Gloria Gaynor sings to Texas’ Harvey victims: ‘You will survive’

Christie D’Zurilla

Gloria Gaynor wants people affected by Harvey to know they will survive, and she’s communicating that message through a new version of the song that has defined her career.

Gaynor, whose “I Will Survive” became an anthem over the years, rewrote the 1978 disco hit to reach out to victims in Texas and posted her rendition on social media Wednesday.

“Hi, my neighbors in Texas,” she said in a video shot while she sat at a piano she was about to play. “This is Gloria Gaynor with a song that hopefully will cheer you up just a little bit.”

Here are the tweaked lyrics, for those who don’t want to hit “play” with the sound on.

First we were afraid
We were petrified
Thinking Texas couldn’t live
With floodwaters this high
We know you spent plenty of time
Preparing for this hurricane
Who could’ve known that it would come
With so much devastating rain
But we will strive
And you’ll survive
With all our love and help and prayers
We will stay strongly by your side
We are your neighbors tried and true
We’ll do all we can for you
And you’ll survive
You will survive, you will survive

Similarly on Monday night, Coldplay unleashed a new original song written after the band was forced to cancel its Friday show in Houston with Hurricane Harvey bearing down.

“This is a new song, and we’ll never play it again,” frontman Chris Martin told an audience in Miami. “It’s a once-off. It’s called ‘Houston.’ We’re going to sing it in Miami for everybody here, and then we’re going to send it over there to everyone who missed the show.”