Concert will note war service

For actor Joe Mantegna, co-hosting the annual National Memorial Day Concert on the West Lawn of the Capitol “has changed my perspective of this whole holiday.”

“It’s a part of the process of what the day should be about, a coming together in remembrance and healing,” says Mantegna, who has been involved with the concert since 2002.

He and co-host Gary Sinise will be on stage today to introduce singers Natalie Cole, CeCe Winans and Jane Monheit and actors Charles Durning, Bonnie Hunt and Dianne Wiest, among others.

Country singer Josh Turner will perform the national anthem, and Erich Kunzel will conduct the National Symphony Orchestra.

Also participating will be former Secretary of State Colin Powell, the joint chiefs of staff and an armed forces color guard.

This year’s 90-minute program will emphasize Iraq, spotlighting soldiers who are serving or have served in the war, says executive producer Jerry Colbert.

“Now the war is contemporary, so we’re filling in the pieces of what you see every night on TV,” Colbert says.

“We’ll have a sequence on those who have been wounded,” he says.

“A lot of guys are coming (to see the show) from Walter Reed.”

Actor Jimmy Smits will narrate a segment on Arlington National Cemetery in remembrance of those who have died in current and past wars.

That will focus on the cemetery’s Section 60, a five-acre area that is the final resting place for many U.S. servicemen and women who lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The area, filled with photos, letters and personal mementos, has become a gathering place for family members and friends who regularly visit the gravesites of loved ones.

The concert will be broadcast from the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol in front of an onsite audience of more than 300,000 people, along with millions more watching at home.

The Armed Forces Radio and Television Service will broadcast the program to U.S. military personnel serving overseas in more than 135 countries.