Stevie Wonder Unearths Four Unheard Songs From ‘Songs in the Key of Life’ Sessions

Stevie Wonder performs at the White House in Washington on Feb. 25, 2009. Wonder marked the 50th anniversary of his landmark 1976 album, “Songs in the Key of Life,” on Monday by releasing four previously unheard recordings from the album’s original sessions. (Pete Souza/Official White House Photo)

Fifty years after Stevie Wonder finished "Songs in the Key of Life," he has gone back into the vault to show there was even more music in the key.

Wonder marked the landmark album's 50th anniversary today by releasing four previously unheard recordings from its original sessions, offering a new glimpse into one of the most celebrated creative periods in popular music.

"It's Easier," "My Life Story of Love," "I Can See the Sun In Late December" and "I'm Into Livin'" make up the new four-song "Songs in the Key of Life" EP.

All four were recorded during the sessions for the sprawling double album, which was released Sept. 28, 1976.

"We've lived with 'Songs in the Key of Life' for fifty years, but there's still more to hear," Wonder said in a statement announcing the release. "We didn't add these songs to the album, but they were part of what I was feeling and discovering as we made it."

Wonder, 76, personally selected the recordings for the anniversary release. John Fischbach and Gary O Adante, two of the engineers who worked on the original album, returned to mix the previously unreleased material. Adante was credited as Gary Olazabal on the 1976 LP.

The new songs also bring back musicians whose careers became intertwined with Wonder's extraordinary run in the 1970s.

Greg Phillinganes, Michael Sembello, Ben Bridges, Jim Horn, Raymond Pounds and longtime Wonder bassist Nathan Watts are among the musicians heard on the recordings.

"I'm Into Livin'" features background vocals from Thelma Houston, Deniece Williams and Shirley Brewer. Houston was months away from taking "Don't Leave Me This Way" to No. 1, while Williams was nearing the beginning of a solo career that would produce hits including "Free" and "Let's Hear It for the Boy."

Former Supremes member Susaye Greene co-wrote "My Life Story of Love" with Wonder. Greene and Wonder later co-wrote "I Can't Help It," recorded by Michael Jackson for his 1979 album "Off the Wall."

There is even a piece of studio lore connecting the new release to the marathon sessions that produced the original album.

According to Wonder's team, the final session ended at 4:54 a.m., prompting Watts to exclaim, "Fo'FiftyFo'!" The phrase became an inside joke used around Wonder's circle to mark the end of a session.

The four recordings arriving 50 years later make that ending a little less final.

"Songs in the Key of Life" was already unusually expansive when Wonder finally released it. The original package contained two LPs and a four-song bonus EP, "A Something's Extra," after roughly two years of recording.

It entered Billboard's album chart at No. 1, making Wonder the first American artist to debut an album in the top spot, and remained No. 1 for 14 weeks.

The album produced two No. 1 singles, "I Wish" and "Sir Duke," while songs including "Isn't She Lovely," "As," "Pastime Paradise" and "Love's in Need of Love Today" became enduring pieces of Wonder's catalog.

It also completed one of the most remarkable Grammy runs in music history.

"Songs in the Key of Life" won album of the year in 1977, giving Wonder his third victory in the category in four years following "Innervisions" and "Fulfillingness' First Finale." The Recording Academy inducted the album into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2002, and the Library of Congress added it to the National Recording Registry in 2005.

Wonder isn't limiting the 50th anniversary to the vault.

He will take "Songs in the Key of Life" back on the road beginning Oct. 13 in Birmingham, England, performing the album in its entirety on an 18-date tour through Europe and the United States.

The U.S. leg begins Nov. 19 at Madison Square Garden in New York and includes stops in Chicago and Washington before a two-night homecoming in Detroit on Dec. 8-9. The tour is scheduled to close Dec. 19 at the Intuit Dome in Los Angeles.

Stevie Wonder • 18 Dates

“Songs in the Key of Life Performances — 50th Anniversary Tour”

Europe & United States • Fall 2026

Oct. 13

Birmingham, England
Utilita Arena

Oct. 15

Paris
Accor Arena

Oct. 18

Copenhagen, Denmark
Royal Arena

Oct. 20

Oslo, Norway
Unity Arena

Oct. 22

Stockholm
3Arena

Oct. 24

Hannover, Germany
ZAG Arena

Oct. 26

Cologne, Germany
LANXESS Arena

Oct. 28

Amsterdam
Ziggo Dome

Nov. 1

Dublin
3Arena

Nov. 3

London
The O2

Nov. 8

Manchester, England
Co-op Live

Nov. 11

Glasgow, Scotland
OVO Hydro

U.S. Dates

Nov. 19

New York
Madison Square Garden

Nov. 21

Chicago
United Center

Nov. 23

Washington, D.C.
Capital One Arena

Dec. 8

Detroit
Fox Theatre

Dec. 9

Detroit
Fox Theatre

Dec. 19

Inglewood, Calif.
Intuit Dome

1. Jay-Z Rape Accuser Recants in Federal Court, Says She Never Met Him

Jay-Z speaks during an interview with GQ released March 23, 2026. The rapper, whose legal name is Shawn Carter, discussed the sexual-assault allegation against him during the interview and maintained it was false. The woman who made the allegation said in a federal court declaration filed Thursday that she had never met Carter and that her claims against him were false. (Screengrab/GQ)

The woman who accused Jay-Z of sexually assaulting her when she was 13 now says she never met him and that her allegations were false.

In a 12-page declaration filed Thursday in federal court in Manhattan, the woman, identified as Jane Doe, said Shawn Carter, Jay-Z’s legal name, never raped or sexually assaulted her and never engaged in inappropriate conduct toward her.

“There is no truth to any of my claims against Mr. Carter,” she said in the declaration, filed under penalty of perjury.

Doe also said she received no money or promise of compensation for making the declaration.

Carter has since dismissed her as a defendant in his ongoing federal lawsuit against attorney Tony Buzbee and other lawyers involved in bringing the original case.

Doe’s current attorney, James Blair Newman Jr., said she continues to maintain that she was sexually assaulted but now acknowledges that she was wrong when she identified Carter. Newman said she apologizes to Carter and his family.

The reversal goes considerably further than Doe had before.

Her original lawsuit, filed in October 2024, accused Sean “Diddy” Combs of sexually assaulting her after the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards. It initially referred to another alleged attacker only as a male celebrity.

An amended complaint filed that December named Carter.

Both men denied the allegations.

Questions about Doe’s account surfaced almost immediately. In a December 2024 interview with NBC News, she acknowledged making mistakes in her recollection while continuing to stand by the allegation.

Among the discrepancies, Doe said she encountered Good Charlotte’s Benji Madden at the party, although a representative said Madden and his brother were touring in the Midwest that night. She also said her father drove several hours to pick her up afterward. He told NBC he did not remember doing so.

Doe voluntarily dismissed the lawsuit with prejudice in February 2025, preventing the same claims from being refiled.

Carter then took the fight to Doe and the lawyers who represented her.

His federal lawsuit accuses Buzbee and others of pursuing an allegation they knew or should have known was unreliable. A central part of Carter’s case is his contention that the attorneys failed to properly investigate Doe before attaching his name to an accusation of child sexual assault.

Carter’s complaint points to information he says was available before his name was added to the case, including Doe’s recent involvement in Mental Health Court and public testimony from her psychiatrist concerning multiple mental-health conditions, prescription medication and a history of hallucinations.

Those details are allegations cited by Carter as part of his argument that Doe’s lawyers had reason to investigate her account more closely. Mental-health treatment itself does not establish that someone is dishonest or that an allegation is false.

Doe’s mental health later entered the court record from her side as well. In seeking permission to continue using a pseudonym, she submitted a declaration from a psychiatrist who said publicly identifying her could destabilize her recovery and worsen her psychiatric symptoms.

Carter spoke publicly about the toll of the accusation during a GQ interview released March 23.

He said the case left him heartbroken and with “uncontrollable anger,” adding that an allegation that serious was something a person “better be super sure” about. Carter maintained in the interview that the accusation was false.

Buzbee has denied wrongdoing and disputed Doe’s latest account of how her original case was handled. He has said several lawyers interviewed her before he personally met her and that she gave them essentially the same story.

A California appeals court sided with Buzbee on a separate Carter lawsuit earlier this month.

In an unpublished Sept. 9 opinion, the three-judge panel upheld dismissal of Carter’s California case and said the evidence before it did not show that Buzbee accused Carter while knowing the allegation was false or with reckless disregard for whether it was true. The court pointed to declarations describing legal teams that interviewed Doe and said they believed her claims.

That decision came before Thursday’s declaration and involved different claims and legal standards.

The new declaration also differs sharply from an earlier, secretly recorded conversation in which investigators approached Doe at her Alabama home and said she appeared to clear Carter. Doe later said she felt intimidated during that encounter and reaffirmed her original allegation.

C.L. Smooth Sues Longtime Associate Over Alleged $132,000 Royalty Diversion

Cover art for Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth’s 1992 single “They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y.).” C.L. Smooth, whose legal name is Corey Penn, alleges in a new federal lawsuit that about $132,000 in SoundExchange royalties was diverted without his knowledge. (Elektra Records/Handout)

C.L. Smooth says he discovered this spring that someone else had been collecting digital royalties in his name for years.

Now the rapper is asking a federal court to make them give the money back.

Smooth, whose legal name is Corey Penn, filed a lawsuit Sept. 13 accusing a longtime associate, the associate’s wife and two companies of diverting approximately $132,000 in SoundExchange royalty payments that Penn says belonged to him.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in White Plains, names Nickolas Taylor, Nichelle Taylor, St. Nick Entertainment Inc. and Prosper Software Solutions Inc., doing business as Taylor Your Care.

Penn has demanded a jury trial.

The federal docket also shows that he filed copies of checks and a 1099 as an exhibit to the complaint.

According to Westfair Business Journal, which reviewed the complaint, Penn says his relationship with Nickolas Taylor stretches back to 1989, when the two were part of the same New York music and social circles.

Taylor began helping Penn book performances around 2001, according to the lawsuit.

There was no written management agreement.

Instead, Penn alleges, the arrangement operated on their longstanding personal relationship and trust. He says he provided Taylor with sensitive information, including passport details needed for international performances.

The relationship eventually deteriorated amid disputes over money and business matters involving St. Nick Entertainment and some of Penn’s independent music projects.

Penn says he stopped doing business with Taylor around 2007.

Around that period, according to the complaint, a SoundExchange account existed in Penn’s name while royalty payments belonging to him were being sent to addresses associated with the Taylors.

Penn says he did not learn that the account already existed until March, when he attempted to establish his own SoundExchange account.

According to the complaint, a subsequent SoundExchange investigation identified approximately $132,000 in royalty payments dating as far back as early 2006.

Penn alleges royalty checks and federal tax forms were sent to the Taylors’ home in Elmsford and other addresses associated with them in Pleasantville and Yonkers.

He further alleges that checks made payable to him were endorsed by Nichelle Taylor before being deposited by the Taylors.

Those allegations have not been proven in court.

SoundExchange occupies a specific part of the music royalty system.

It collects statutory digital performance royalties for sound recordings played through noninteractive services such as SiriusXM, Pandora and internet radio and distributes that money to featured artists and sound-recording rights owners.

Those are different from the songwriting and publishing royalties generated by the underlying composition.

Penn says he has since regained control of the SoundExchange account and received about $30,000 in accumulated royalties covering 2023 through 2026.

He accuses the defendants of fraud, conversion, breach of fiduciary duty, aiding and abetting breach of fiduciary duty and unjust enrichment.

Penn is seeking the return of money he alleges was wrongfully obtained as well as unspecified punitive damages.

That does not mean he is simply “suing for $132,000.”

In fact, the federal docket contains an unusual correction that could otherwise create confusion about how much money is at stake.

When the case was opened, the court’s statistical information listed a $132 million demand. The clerk corrected that entry the following day, stating that the figure had been entered erroneously and changing the dollar demand to none.

The roughly $132,000 figure instead represents the amount Penn alleges SoundExchange identified as having been diverted.

No response from the defendants was available in the publicly accessible docket reviewed for this story. That docket was last retrieved Sept. 14 and notes that a more recent listing may be available through PACER.

Westfair reported that efforts to locate the Taylors for comment were unsuccessful.

The dispute reaches into a catalog that has been part of hip-hop for more than three decades.

Penn rose to prominence alongside producer Pete Rock as Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth. The duo released “All Souled Out” in 1991, followed by the albums “Mecca and the Soul Brother” in 1992 and “The Main Ingredient” in 1994.

“Mecca and the Soul Brother” included “They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y.),” the duo’s enduring tribute to Troy “Trouble T Roy” Dixon of Heavy D & The Boyz.

C.L. Smooth’s official biography still describes “T.R.O.Y.” as the record most closely associated with his career more than three decades later.

The music has kept playing.

Penn’s lawsuit now asks who was getting paid when it did.