Tony Bennett's wife is opening up about the late crooner's final moments.
In an interview with Today, Susan Benedetto recalled the last words her husband said to her before he died July 21 at age 96 after his battle with Alzheimer's disease.
"That he loved me," she said. "Yeah. He would wake up every day and still say that. He woke up happy every day. Even if he had had a bad day or night, he didn't remember it. That was the only blessing. He woke up happy. And he's just like, 'Susan. You're the best thing that ever happened to me.' And he would say that to me all the time."
In the days before Bennett's death, Benedetto said he could still remember his songs, even singing one of his early classics.
"He sang 'Because of You.' We were getting him up to exercise, and so it was easy to just latch onto the piano," she said.
"And I said, 'Ton, why don't you get up and you can sing?' You know, any excuse to just get him up. I said, 'Why don't you sing?' He's like, 'What do you want to hear?' I said, 'How about singing 'Because of You?'' So he sang 'Because of You.'"
Benedetto added: "Literally, that was the last song he sang."
The song appeared on Bennett's debut album, "Because of You," which was released in 1952 and helped establish him as a popular singer. Benedetto said that the fact that it was Bennett's last song represented a kind of balance.
"Well, of course, it bookends his career, if you think just musically speaking," she said. "That was his first hit. And then that was literally just the last song that he sang. So the music never left him.
"And when he did have more alert moments, or, like, first thing in the morning, he didn't ask really about anyone or anything except, 'Am I working tonight?' And the other day he's like, 'Susan, am I in a good theater tonight?' He'd say stuff like that."
Bennett died in his hometown of New York City two weeks before his birthday.
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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