Lady Gaga Performs For The Shepards

  Lady Gaga  performed at the Human Rights Campaign dinner in Washington D.C. on Saturday Night. 

Photo: Lady Gaga Performs For The Shepards

   And for this performance the 23-year-old Gaga left her usual panty-less and bootylicious costumes at home, opting for a demure black dress topped with a pair of John Lennon inspired sunglasses.

  The singer performed a version of Lennon's "Imagine" but changed the lyrics to reflect the tragedy of Matthew Shepard, a gay college student who was murdered in 1998.

  "I'm not going to play one of my songs tonight, because tonight is not about me. It's about you," Gaga said, as Shepard's parents Judy and Dennis reportedly looked on.

  The Shepards were given the Edward M. Kennedy National Leadership Award.

  Matthew Wayne Shepard was a student at the University of Wyoming who was tortured and murdered near Laramie, Wyoming in 1998. He was attacked on the night of October 6–7, 1998 and died at Poudre Valley Hospital in Fort Collins, Colorado, on October 12 from severe head injuries.

  During the trial, witnesses stated that Shepard was targeted because he was gay. Shepard's murder brought national, as well as international, attention to the issue of hate crime legislation at the state and federal levels.
  NY Daily News  contributed to the report.