{"id":511740,"date":"2026-06-21T23:20:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-21T23:20:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/511740\/"},"modified":"2026-06-21T23:20:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-21T23:20:13","slug":"michael-jackson-and-roberta-flack-singing-when-we-grow-up-is-pure-magic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/511740\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael Jackson and Roberta Flack singing ‘When We Grow Up’ is pure magic"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every once in a while, a gem of an old performance starts trending online, and you wonder, how have I never seen that before? Michael Jackson<\/a> is one of the most popular entertainers ever to live<\/a>, and Roberta Flack<\/a> is one of the most prominent singers of the \u201870s, so where has their magical performance together in 1974 on the Free to Be\u2026You and Me<\/a> TV special been hiding all this time?<\/p>\n

The TV special was based on a popular 1972 album put together by the actress Marlo Thomas, fresh off her hit show<\/a> That Girl, and was sponsored byMs., a popular feminist<\/a> magazine. The goal of the project, which would become a gold album, a television special, and a foundation, was to show the younger generation that they can be whoever they want to be<\/a>. The video gained attention recently after being shared on X by Melodies and Masterpieces<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Michael Jackson and Roberta Flack sing \u2018When We Grow Up\u2019<\/p>\n

Diana Ross originally sang \u201cWhen We Grow Up\u201d on the album, but Jackson and Flack sang it as a duet on the TV show, dressed as kids hanging out in an attic. The song is all about self-acceptance<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Well, I don\u2019t care if you\u2019re pretty at all<\/p>\n

And I don\u2019t care if you never get tall.<\/p>\n

I like what you look like\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2026 and you\u2019re nice small.<\/p>\n

We don\u2019t have to change at all.<\/p>\n

During the performance, there were a few slight nods to The Marx Brothers, with Jackson shaking his fake microphone like Groucho did with his cigar. The pair also pretend to be mirror images of one another, a famous bit from the 1933 Marx Brothers\u2019 film Duck Soup. Both children hope for a future when they can visit the moon, a big topic just five years after the Apollo 11 mission<\/a>. The pair also pretends to walk on the moon, a nice bit of foreshadowing for Jackson\u2019s dance move that would propel him to superstardom<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Roberta Flack on working with Michael Jackson<\/p>\n

Years later, in 2017, Flack talked about working with Jackson, noting that he didn\u2019t need to prepare much for the performance. \u201cI always felt that Michael Jackson was one of the people who didn\u2019t have to prepare that much, even from the time he was a very little kid,\u201d she told The Huffington Post<\/a>. \u201cI mean, I think I\u2019m sweeter than he is in the video with my ponytails. (laughs) But I\u2019ll tell you, it was such a joy to work with him because he was so bright and sharp. We didn\u2019t have to do it a bunch of times. We did it a few times, and it was a lot of fun. When you have that sort of innate and instinctive gift, you can sort of relax and let it flow. But sometimes, you have to be truly inspired. Even Michael had to be truly inspired.\u201d<\/p>\n

That same year, 1974, Jackson and his brothers, The Jackson 5, covered Flack\u2019s mammoth hit, \u201cKilling Me Softly<\/a>,\u201d on The Tonight Show. The performance was a medley that also featured \u201cBy The Time I Get To Phoenix,\u201d sung by Jermaine, and \u201cDanny Boy,\u201d by Jackie.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s easy to forget that before he was the King of Pop, Michael Jackson was just a kid singing about being okay with who you are, alongside one of the greatest voices of his generation. Decades later, the message still lands. Maybe even more than it did then.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared last year. It has been updated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Every once in a while, a gem of an old performance starts trending online, and you wonder, how…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":511741,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[49754,218548,218549,218550,93,218551,61,60,139737,218552,139733,218553,218554,39478,278,60499,64974,906,218555],"class_list":["post-511740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-1970s","tag-218548","tag-1974-tv","tag-duck-soup","tag-entertainment","tag-free-to-be-you-and-me","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-jackie-jackson","tag-jackson-flack-duet","tag-jermaine-jackson","tag-marlo-thomas","tag-marx-brothers","tag-michael-jackson","tag-music","tag-nostalgia","tag-roberta-flack","tag-the-tonight-show","tag-working-together"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=511740"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511740\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/511741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=511740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=511740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=511740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}