Most artists would find it intimidating to ask a musical icon like Elton John to duet with them — but that didn’t seem to be the case for British-Japanese singer Rina Sawayama.
“I just asked him and he said yes!” Sawayama says via video chat from her London home. Of course, it helped that John had already been a vocal cheerleader of the singer and her 2020 debut album “Sawayama,” a record that put the 30-year-old performer on the cusp of a major pop breakthrough.
Together, Sawayama and John reworked the album’s penultimate track, “Chosen Family,” an ode from Sawayama, who is pansexual, to her LGBTQ support network. Understandably, John had a deep appreciation for the sentiment.