Tony Bennett's Wife Susan and Son Danny Reflect on the Singer’s Final Days Before His Death

Tony Bennett's love is here to stay.
 
Nearly two weeks after the music icon died at the age of 96, his wife Susan and eldest son Danny are detailing his last moments, noting that he "didn't just light up the room, he loved the room."
 
"He said it until the day he died," Danny told Today in an Aug. 3 interview. "It's all about love."
 
As Susan, who wed Tony in 2007, noted, "We just absolutely loved each other and he was my life."
 
The 20-time Grammy winner—who is also survived by kids Dae, Johanna and Antonia—was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 2016. But as Susan and Danny explained, though the condition tends to affect memory, Tony always remembered his music.
 
"Even just a couple days before, he was singing," Susan shared. "We were getting him up to exercise and so it was easy to just latch on to the piano. And I said, ‘Tony, why don't you get up and you can sing.' You know, any excuse to just get him up…So he sang, ‘Because of You.' Literally that was the last song he sang."

Tony's last song was the 1951 hit that skyrocketed his music career, serving as a full circle moment.
 
"Of course, it bookends his career, just musically speaking," Susan added. "It was his first hit and it was literally the last song that he sang, but the music never left him."

In addition to his music, his adoration for those closest to him remained as well.

"His last words to me were, ‘Thank you,'" Danny said. "Can't say it better than that."

As for Susan, Tony's last words to her was simply that he loved her.
 
"He would wake up every day and still say that," she noted. "He woke up happy every day, even if he had a bad day or night, you know, he didn't remember it, that was the only blessing. He woke up happy like, ‘Susan, you're the best thing that ever happened to me.'"

And though Tony's spanned over seven decades and touched a range of audiences, Susan shared that her husband didn't want to "remembered as the best."
 
"He just really wanted to be remembered as a nice person," she continued. "And I think all the outpouring of love from people that we know and love to complete strangers has proven that."

(E! and Today are part of the NBCUniversal family.)

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