The music legend revealed his cancer diagnosis to fans in a December 2025 social media post
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NEED TO KNOW
- Barry Manilow is seen in public for the first time since undergoing a lobectomy procedure following a lung cancer diagnosis
- The “Mandy” singer shared the news with his fans in a December social media post
- Following the announcement, Manilow postponed his farewell tour to recover from the surgery
Barry Manilow was photographed for the first time since he underwent a lobectomy to treat lung cancer.
Manilow, 82, can be seen smiling in New York City in the photos taken on Friday, April 24. The outing comes four months after the lobectomy procedure in December 2025 following his diagnosis with stage 1 lung cancer a month earlier.
The “Mandy” singer shared his health journey with fans, revealing in a Dec. 22 statement on his Facebook page that he would be rescheduling his farewell tour because a "cancerous spot" was found in his left lung.
"As many of you know I recently went through six weeks of bronchitis followed by a relapse of another five weeks," the musician said at the time. "Even though I was over the bronchitis and back on stage at the Westgate Las Vegas, my wonderful doctor ordered an MRI to make sure that everything was OK."
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"The MRI discovered a cancerous spot on my left lung that needs to be removed. It's pure luck (and a great doctor) that it was found so early. That's the good news,” his post continued, adding that he would need surgery.
In early January, the Emmy, Grammy, and Tony winner shared another update to social media, this time letting his fans know he was "Better Today!" with a smiling selfie in his hospital gown.
The following month, he announced via Instagram that he had a "very depressing visit" to his surgeon, and would need to postpone more tour dates because his “lungs [weren’t] ready yet.”
In March, the "Copacabana" singer opened up exclusively to PEOPLE about his experience following the diagnosis.
“You just don’t even think about [how fragile life is],” he said. And suddenly, you have lung cancer," Manilow told PEOPLE. "But I’m still here. I’m not all here; there’s part of me that isn’t here — they took out a part of me, and now I’ve got to figure out, ‘What do I do?’”
Reflecting on his doctor discovering the "cancerous spot" during his MRI, he added, “They don’t even know how long I had this thing sitting on me.”
“It could have been years,” Manilow continued. “If it had gone any further, then I would be up s—’s creek. It just so happened that it hadn’t spread, and boy oh boy, I thought I might be dying.”
Though he spent seven days in the ICU after his lobectomy to remove the diseased part of the lung, he said he didn’t recall much.
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“I don’t remember it, thank goodness, because it was a nightmare,” Manilow said. “I’m one of the lucky ones; I don’t have to have chemo, radiation and all that stuff.”
The health scare has put things into perspective for the music legend.
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“It has really, really made me take stock of my life,” Manilow told PEOPLE. “This made me stop and think about: Have I done what I wanted to do, and have I made people happy? Have I been a good friend? All of those cornball things that I’ve read for all of my life, I started to think about that, too. It really did stop me in my tracks.”
“And the answers are yes," he continued. "And as a matter of fact, there are more yeses than I ever thought.”
Manilow’s 33rd studio album, What a Time, is set for release on June 5.