Beyonce and Bilal Slay at 2016 BET Awards #BETAWARDS

movies and tv, musicJune 27, 2016Comments Off on Beyonce and Bilal Slay at 2016 BET Awards #BETAWARDS

2016 BET Awards

In a night filled with incredible performances, two artists managed to stand out at last night’s 2016 BET Awards.

Beyonce pulled off an incredible surprise performance of “Freedom” to open the show. She was joined by Kendrick Lamar, and the performance was A-MA-ZING!!

The song appears on her recently released Lemonade album. and its powerful message made it a favorite of mine. But seeing it performed live last night, I was blown away by both the song and the singer.

It started with Beyonce silently awaiting her dancers as they marched into the theater to Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech. They proceeded to dance in formation in a water-covered stage, the splashes punctuating the force of the song.

Then Kendrick joined her to rap his verse, before they ended the song, kicking up water and singing with ferocity.

Thanks to BET, here is a video of last night’s performance:

BET provided a series of tributes to Prince throughout the show, and they were all incredible – especially Jennifer Hudson’s vocals on “Purple Rain,” and Sheila E.’s closing medley that included “Erotic City” and “Let’s Go Crazy.”

But for me, the stand-out performance of all of the Prince tributes was soul singer Bilal, who appeared to be channeling the Purple One throughout his performance of “The Beautiful Ones,” from the Purple Rain soundtrack.

It was so very yowsa! It even gave me chills listening to it.

Again, thanks to BET, here is a video of Bilal’s performance, which is preceeded by Erykah Badu and The Roots covering “The Ballad of Dorothy Parker” from 1987’s Sign O’ the Times. Bilal’s part starts at the 3 minute mark in the video.

Did you have a favorite performance from the BET Awards? Let me know in the comments. I’d also love to hear what you thought of the two performances I picked as the best of the best from last night.


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About zengrrl

I'm Michelle Snow, the writer and creator of Zengrrl. I write about travel, entertainment, women's issues, health, body positivity, and more, both for this blog and freelance. I have also authored/co-authored four guidebooks on Orlando and Florida. If you aren't already following me, the links are below, as well as on the top right of this page. Thanks!

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