Lee Ann Womack, the Grammy-winning country music singer-songwriter, says her biggest turn-on is music and she dislikes when tall people stand too close to her.
She also is a mother of two children, which, she said, makes headlining the Giddy-Up Gala fundraiser Saturday night for Children’s Hospital in Aurora all the more meaningful for her.
Saturday morning, Womack toured the hospital, including the neonatal intensive care unit, to see where the money that her talent is helping raise will go.
“Just being a mom and seeing the things I’ve seen today, it always makes you think about what you can do and how fortunate you are,” Womack said. “I was very glad to be able to see it myself.”
Including the gala, the Children’s Hospital Foundation organizes four fundraising events each year, said foundation vice president Peggy Warner.
This event used to be called the Buckaroo Ball but was renamed after the foundation stopped organizing it for a couple of years.
Last year, the hospital received about $42 million from grants, donations and fundraising. About $35 million of that was grants, which is the fifth-largest amount received by a children’s hospital in the country, said hospital chief executive Jim Shmerling.
The money from the gala will go toward research to “accelerate discovery, intervention and to find potential cures for some diseases,” he said.
The foundation and Shmerling singled out Womack to perform at the fundraising event.
“I came from Nashville,” Shmer ling said. “And country music is very active in helping out the Children’s Hospital.”
In the neonatal intensive care unit, Womack met families with babies who were being treated and learned about advanced technologies used to accelerate healing.
“It’s fun for our staff to talk about their work,” Warner said. “They can brag about their unit, which is fun.”
Sarah Horn: 303-954-1638 or shorn@denverpost.com
