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Led Zeppelin, Buddy Guy, ballerina Natalia Makarova, David Letterman, and Dustin Hoffman were this year’s recipients of Kennedy Center Honors in Washington D.C. on Sunday.

President Obama led tributes to the recipients at a special afternoon reception at the East Room of the White House, referring to Buddy Guy as one of the “last guardians of the great American blues” and joking that “a generation of young people survived teenage angst with a pair of headphones and a Zeppelin album, and a generation of parents wondered what all that noise was about.”

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The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts has revealed that the recipients of the 2012 Kennedy Center Honors will be Buddy Guy, Led Zeppelin, David Letterman, Dustin Hoffman and ballerina Natalia Makarova.

Kennedy Center Chairman, David M. Rubenstein, said “Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant transformed the sound of rock & roll with their lyricism and innovative song structures, infusing blues into the sound of rock & roll and laying the foundation for countless rock bands.”

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Paul McCartney was back at the White House on Sunday night to receive the Kennedy Center award from President Obama. In June, McCartney received the Library of Congress Gershwin Prize for Popular Song and performed in front of the President and First Lady in the East Room.

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“I’m the President, but he’s The Boss” joked President Obama as he presented Bruce Springsteen with a Kennedy Center award for his contributions to US culture.

Obama congratulates Bruce Springsteen (AP Photo)

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