Bruce Springsteen Gives 2 Songs Their Public Live Debuts At Stand Up For Heroes 2026

Bruce Springsteen opened his set Monday night with a dirty joke about a librarian and a song he’d never played at a public concert. “Hello Sunshine” was the first of two Western Stars songs to get their public live debuts during Springsteen’s four-song solo acoustic set at the 20th annual Stand Up For Heroes benefit at Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall in New York City.

The New York Comedy Festival and the Bob Woodruff Foundation presented the benefit, which also featured musicians Alex Warren and The Resilient and comedians Josh Johnson, Hasan Minhaj and Jon Stewart. The Woodruff family established the foundation after ABC News correspondent Bob Woodruff was severely wounded by a roadside bomb while reporting in Iraq in 2006. The foundation supports veterans, service members, military families and caregivers. It reported that Stand Up For Heroes had raised $117 million ahead of this year’s benefit.

Springsteen has been part of Stand Up For Heroes since the inaugural benefit in 2007, when he played three acoustic songs and put his own Harley-Davidson up for auction. Telling off-color jokes between songs has become part of his routine at the benefit, a tradition he continued Monday.

“Hello Sunshine” was the first single from Springsteen’s 2019 album Western Stars. Both it and “Moonlight Motel” appeared in the companion concert film, which featured Springsteen backed by a band and orchestra. He also reportedly played both songs at a private event at Transparent Clinch Gallery in Asbury Park, New Jersey, on October 16, according to NJArts.net.

Springsteen followed “Hello Sunshine” with “I’ll Work For Your Love,” a song from 2007’s Magic that leans on Catholic imagery to make a promise of devotion. He played it in the same slot at the 10th annual Stand Up For Heroes in 2016.

A joke about dildos preceded “Moonlight Motel,” the ballad that closes Western Stars. Its narrator returns to a boarded-up roadside motel and pours out a shot of whiskey in the parking lot in memory of a former lover.

Springsteen told one more bawdy joke before closing with “Dancing In The Dark,” the lead single from 1984’s Born In The U.S.A. and his highest-charting Billboard Hot 100 hit at No. 2. The song also closed his sets at the 2016 and 2018 benefits.

Watch audience-shot video of all four songs, along with a few of Springsteen’s jokes, below.