The Fugees are getting back together on the Great Lawn. Ms. Lauryn Hill and Wyclef Jean will headline the 2026 Global Citizen Festival in Central Park on September 26, marking the 30th anniversary of their landmark album “The Score,” alongside Lenny Kravitz, John Legend, Lainey Wilson, Shaboozey and Tomorrow X Together.
Actor Hugh Jackman will host the free concert, with guest appearances from actress Rachel Brosnahan and television host Gayle King, according to Global Citizen. Jackman has long served as an ambassador for the organization. As reported by NBC10 Philadelphia, the Fugees also closed out Global Citizen's weeklong climate programming in Rio de Janeiro, and Hill and Wyclef Jean performed together in June at the 2026 Global Citizen Live festival there.
The Central Park concert, as the outlet's report notes, is timed to coincide with the end of the United Nations General Assembly's yearly high-level meetings. The Great Lawn has served as the festival's flagship venue since its first show in September 2012, drawing a crowd of roughly 60,000 each year, per Global Citizen.
How New Yorkers Can Get In
Most tickets to the show remain free, distributed through a lottery that requires fans to complete calls to action on the Global Citizen app, such as petitioning countries to direct international development funds toward specific causes, per the outlet's report. This year, the festival is also introducing a $25 instant ticket option, and Global Citizen says 100% of those charitable donations will flow back into New York City, supporting the City Parks Foundation and organizations serving people experiencing homelessness, according to Pollstar.
“The Score,” released on February 13, 1996, went on to win two Grammy Awards including Best Rap Album and produced multi-platinum singles like “Killing Me Softly” and “Ready or Not,” according to Wikipedia. The reunion caps a run of festival appearances timed to the album's 30th anniversary, including Hill's music festival in London celebrating the sounds of the African diaspora, per the same NBC10 Philadelphia report. Country star Lainey Wilson, who comes from a family of farmers, has said she's drawn to Global Citizen's support for the International Fund for Agricultural Development, and festival organizer Hugh Evans has noted the lineup carries an unusually strong country-music presence this year.
The Money Behind the Music
Global Citizen is also leaning on its partnership with FIFA ahead of the 2026 World Cup. FIFA President Gianni Infantino announced in September 2025 that $1 from every ticket sold for World Cup matches across North America will go to the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund, according to Inside FIFA. Global Citizen also produced the World Cup's first halftime show, a collaboration organizers say raised more than $60 million, per the NBC10 Philadelphia report.
The festival's stated priorities this year are steep: $100 million to improve food security for 1.5 million smallholder farmers, another $100 million to provide 2 million children with education, nutritious food and healthcare, and $1.5 billion to expand clean energy across the Indo-Pacific region, according to the outlet. Evans has said he hopes to use the September concert to shore up commitments that remain outstanding, with asks directed at countries including Spain, Norway, Ireland, Kenya, Japan, Denmark and Australia — notably, the United States is not among the nations targeted this year.
Evans pointed to the current administration's dismantling of the U.S. Agency for International Development as part of the shifting landscape, and described the United States, once the world's single largest aid donor, as “a global leader that is an incredible laggard,” per NBC10 Philadelphia's report. He also said France's president, Emmanuel Macron, often talks about the country's leadership on education but that France may not actually be stepping up, and Evans has separately called on France to support the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund, Gavi, Education Cannot Wait and other education partners. Despite the headwinds, Evans said he remains optimistic the foreign-aid picture will shift, adding that future political leaders need to understand how power works.
A Track Record of Pledges
Last September's Central Park festival, headlined by Shakira and Cardi B, secured pledges to deliver clean energy to 4.6 million African homes and mobilize $200 million for Amazon rainforest protection, according to MyNorthwest. This year's campaign is aiming to expand electricity access to 2.5 million homes worldwide as part of its broader energy and agricultural push.
Ahead of the flagship concerts, Global Citizen also expanded its policy summits to Africa, launching Global Citizen NOW: Johannesburg in November 2025 to secure energy access commitments for more than 17.5 million African homes by 2030, convening heads of state and corporate executives on the continent. Since the organization's founding in 2008, its app users and advocates have taken more than 33.5 million actions, helping distribute over $43.6 billion in partner funding and reaching an estimated 1.29 billion lives, according to Global Citizen's own figures.
The festival was co-founded in 2012 by Evans and Ryan Gall, with Coldplay frontman Chris Martin serving as its official curator since 2015, helping recruit top-tier headliners each year. Hoodline previously covered Central Park's World Cup bash tied to Global Citizen's FIFA partnership, and reported on the Chris Brown and Usher tour's education fund tie-in.
