And Mick Jagger looked happy and healthy as he chuckled on arrival at JFK Airport, in New York City on Sunday — just weeks after undergoing heart surgery.

The Rolling Stones icon, 75, threw his head back while he laughed and joked around in the airport terminals.

Mick packed light for his trip to the Big Apple ahead of the tour as he piled all of his belongings into a rucksack which he wore on one shoulder. 

The lead singer was seen in the terminal in a padded jacket, a navy baseball cap and matching sunglasses. 

His appearance comes after he threw himself back into tour rehearsals for the band's North American shows which were postponed to give the legendary singer time to focus on his recovery. 

A source told The Sun: 'Mick is delighted to be back to full health and feels 100 per cent after his op. He is his normal chipper and positive self.

'Doctors are really pleased with his progress and were happy to give him a clean bill of health.

'His healthy eating has really helped with his recovery and he's been taking it easy and resting, as well as enjoying down time with his friends and family. The health scare has just reminded him to keep taking good care of himself.'

Mick had heart valve replacement surgery using a technique pioneered by Professor Alain Cribier.

His surgery method, transcatherter aortic valve replacement, or TAVR, allows surgeons to swap a patient's cardiac valves without resorting to open heart surgery and cracking open their chests. As a result, recovery times are far quicker.

The most common — and serious — of valve diseases, age-related aortic stenosis occurs when the valve narrows and hardens with calcium deposits.

Valve replacement has historically been done by opening the chest surgically, stopping the heart, and placing the patient on a heart and lung blood machine - all, of course, under general anaesthesia.

More than 200,000 such procedures are performed every year worldwide, according to NewHeartValve, in Britain.

Cribier's technique, done under local anaesthesia, is minimally invasive by comparison and has far shorter recovery times.

A surgeon or cardiologist accesses the femoral artery with an incision near the groin to insert a catheter fitted with a replacement valve inside a collapsed stent, and a balloon for inflating it.

The new heart valve, once expanded, pushes the old one out of the way and takes over the job of regulating blood flow. 'It has revolutionised patient care in this area,' Montpellier-based cardiologist Stephane Cade told AFP.