While George Michael may have been a household name, the late singer has also touched people’s lives on a personal level with his feel-good anthems like “Faith” and “Freedom.”
Did you know that Michael regularly volunteered at a local homeless shelter or that he was the sole star in the celebrity version of “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire” pledging to donate his own money to his chosen charity, if he wouldn’t give a correct answer and lost his prize pool.
Image source: georgemichael.com
Four of George Michael’s most generous acts of kindness:
1. Tip a waitress £5,000
When Michael found out that his waitress was a student nurse, who was struggling to make ends meet due to a crippling debt, Michael generously tipped his stunned waitress in the amount of £5,000. Enough to pay off the young nurse’s debt.
2. Paying for a stranger’s IVF treatment
When a contestant on the popular game show “Deal Or No Deal” failed to reach her goal for the prize to fund her next IVF treatment, Michael anonymously donated £15,000 to fund the woman’s treatment. At the time, the lucky lady had no idea that it was Michael who helped finance her dream of becoming a mother, as Michael donated the lump sum by calling the producers at “Deal or No Deal”.
3. Donating the royalties of two hit songs
While you’d have to live under a rock not to hear “Last Christmas” or “Everything She Wants,” you may not know that Michael chose to donate the ongoing royalties from both songs to Ethiopian famine relief.
4. Donate George Lennon’s piano to the Beatles Story Museum
When the piano on which George Lennon composed ‘Imagine’ came up for sale, Michael bought the piano for £1.45 million so that he could donate it to the Beatles Story Museum. Michael believed the piano was a treasure that should not be locked away in a private collection and should be shared with the public.